And Then There Were Ponies
by YetAnotherBrony
Summary: Twilight and her friends discover that once their world had been inhabited by strange creatures known as humans.. What happened to them? What does it mean for the ponies? Their friendships will endure numerous trials as they uncover the truth.
1. Chapter 1: Of Ponies and Men

**And Then There Were Ponies Chapter 1: Of Ponies and Men**

The Grand Galloping Gala. Twilight was unsure why she had bothered to show up after how things went last time. Perhaps last time went so poorly she felt the need to redeem herself, and somehow doing the gala the right way this time would make it as though the previous time never happened. No, more than likely it was that she did not want to refuse tickets that Princess Celestia had given her, and that anypony should be grateful to have. She tried to brush away that thought though, because that reason seemed stupid compared to the reasons almost any other pony would likely have for going. Then again, most of the reasons she could come up with for why she was here suffered from that same problem. She also didn't want to think about how she used the tickets when she should have just given them away. Twilight let out a sigh, and all these thoughts relating to why she was here with it. It didn't matter why she was here. She was, and this time she was going to spend the entire time with her friends.

Rainbow Dash on the other hoof knew exactly why she was here. The Wonderbolts were her idols, and regardless of what happened last time, she couldn't just pass up an opportunity to see them. A part of her wanted to abandon her friends and seek them out, but she couldn't just leave her friends hanging like that, especially not when they had all agreed to stick together. She wasn't going to let that get in the way of her seeing the Wonderbolts though. They were all going to see them. Rainbow Dash believed that if you had to be patient then that just meant you weren't going fast enough, but they had already agreed to a schedule beforehand, so there was nothing she could do. It was okay though. She was going to see the Wonderbolts, and this time so would the only other ponies in all of Equestria who even came close to their awesomeness. Yes, even Pinkie Pie, Rainbow Dash had learned, was worthy of that title.

Pinkie Pie was the only of the main ponies not thinking about their previous Gala shenanigans. In fact, that was the last thing on Pinkie Pie's mind. If left to her own devices, Pinkie Pie would probably nearly recreate her last appearance at the Gala. Where there was a party, there was Pinkie Pie! Even a lame hoity-toity party like this needed a little Pink to be complete. Despite how her words and actions may come across, Pinkie Pie did give things more thought then most ponies would give her credit for, but this moment did not reflect that. Her thoughts at the moment could best be summarized by "!"

Rarity still was not sure what to make of romance because of the way her hopes and dreams had been dashed so thoroughly last time. However, a party as classy as this merited Rarity's presence anyway. Sophistication, Class, and most of all Style. These were the traits that embodied the Gala, and these were the traits that embodied Rarity. She had come in the most exquisite gown which was a slight modification of last time's, but it made a tenfold improvement in its pizzazz. She wasn't sure why, nor did she much care to think on it, but she wanted to make that mare who could have been the mare of her dreams – if he weren't so selfish – jealous. Thankfully, she had a stroke of brilliance in the middle of the night a few days ago. Rarity was most pleased with the results. Maybe it was just her imagination, and it probably was, but the eyes of everypony seemed to fall on her whenever they didn't have something else to look at. Her beauty had captivated them all.

Applejack, on still another hoof, saw a heap of potential customers. It wasn't that she fancied money all that much, but she would feel lazy having fun for so many hours without doing a lick of work, especially when there was as good of a business opportunity as this-un. Besides, there were a few little things she would like to be able to get for the family that would take a lot more than making a couple bits here and there to get. She didn't have much last time, but she now had the help of all her friends, and they had tackled a far side more difficult tasks than this. She had had her food dismissed as "common carnival fair" last time but she wasn't gonna let that get her down. After all, it had come from somepony who hadn't even tried hard enough to keep a great mare like Rarity around. Rarity and Applejack hadn't always seen eye to eye, but they had come to an understanding, and actually really liked each other when they didn't let petty differences about dirt and such get in the way.

Then there was Fluttershy who felt a not too unfamiliar pit in her stomach. She was nervous. She was half expecting to bump into herself from their previous visit. She had been scary, and lately she had been having nightmares about the scary version of herself switching places with the real her. But that wasn't even the worst part. The worst part was that in these dreams everyone liked the scary her better than the weak, helpless her. She knew better, but she still felt this urge to ask her friends anyway if they preferred her the way she was. She suppressed this urge though, as she often did with many urges, for she was sure her friends were preoccupied thinking about more important things, and she didn't want to bother them. At least she would get to see some animals, and her friends would even be with her, but somehow her friends being there just made her more nervous about the whole thing. What if they don't like animals? What if they get really bored? Will they blame me for having opted to put such a boring event into Twilight's master schedule?

Ironically, Spike, who had insisted that everypony stick together, was instead at a meeting for his Rarity fan club. Spike had wanted an identity outside of just being Twilight's assistant, so naturally Twilight advised him to play to his strengths, but starting a Rarity fan club wasn't exactly what Twilight had in mind. No doubt he would have just moved the meeting to a different night, if his first real member wasn't scheduled to show up at this meeting. Twilight thought it was all a bit crazy, but it was good to see Spike seem so excited about something, especially since he had seemingly been a bit down lately. It had been a slow downward trend ever since Owlicious had helped out for a bit. Perhaps that had somehow made him think his job was too easy to be meaningful. Twilight had tried to reassure him on a number of occasions, but these were only a temporary fix to a larger problem it seemed. Surprisingly, the Rarity fan club really did the trick, as he had been in much brighter spirits lately.

First on Twilight's master schedule was to visit the garden and view what wildlife they could while there. Naturally, Fluttershy had volunteered to be last, but since she was always last, Twilight decided it would be a good idea to make her first for a change. Twilight couldn't decide if this was a reward for her kindness, or a way of showing her that going first is okay, but regardless she knew she was doing a favor for a friend. Twilight had considered putting Rainbow Dash last for volunteering to go first, however it didn't take Twilight long to realize she would just have been doing that out of spite, so instead all the other ponies had their events chosen in random order. Twilight had ended up last but she was okay with that, especially since then she could be sure nopony would complain about it.

Twilight's thoughts had been interrupted by a soft voice calling out, "It's okay animals, don't be shy. Actually, there is nothing wrong with being shy but could we please see you anyway? You have nothing to fear. We just want to help." The bushes on either side of them rustled a little but Fluttershy's call had gone largely ignored. "Please come out. You don't even have to come near me. We just want to see you so we can talk. Or we could all play the silent game if you'd prefer." pleaded Fluttershy, but this time not even so much as a leaf fell off a tree or bush.

"Geez, even I wouldn't go near somepony as creepy sounding as that," Pinkie Pie said in her usually jubilant manner while bouncing forward. Pinkie Pie proceeded to bounce around to various bushes and greeted each with a "Woof woof."

"I hate to tell an expert that she is taking the wrong approach to something in their expertise, but Pinkie Pie is right. Well she was before she started..." began Twilight while looking over at Pinkie Pie's who was now hissing at a tree. "...being Pinkie Pie," finished Twilight after a brief Pause.

"Why don't these animals like me? Why are they so different from the animals around Ponyville?" sighed Fluttershy.

"I don't think that is it at all Fluttershy. These animals have no idea who you are, but you have grown up around the animals in Ponyville. You may have an innate talent for working with animals, but you still have to make a good first impression to gain the animals' trust, which is something you probably haven't had to do for a while, because any animals around Ponyville who haven't come into contact with you directly probably have heard from those who have. Think back Fluttershy. When you first befriended the animals of Ponyville, you did it a different way didn't you?"

Fluttershy couldn't believe she hadn't thought of that herself. Fluttershy unleashed her wings and shouted with excitement, "YES!" Fluttershy withdrew wings back and continued in her usual whisper, "I mean, yes, of course. When I befriended the animals of Ponyville I was scared and alone. I didn't try to make friends; it just sorta happened. I bet if I just wait patiently they'll come out." Fluttershy looked to Pinkie Pie who was now switching between chirping, barking, and at one point she could have sworn she heard her clucking. "Then again, maybe not," sighed Fluttershy.

"Don't worry Shy, I'm on it," said Rainbow Dash's afterimage. She had barely gotten the words out of her mouth when she was dragging Pinkie Pie away from the animals. Rainbow Dash grumbled while Dragging Pinkie Pie, "Come on Pinkie Pie, you can't actually think that is going to work."

"Well of course it isn't. But it sure is fun. And this is a giant party after all," replied Pinkie Pie.

"Yes, this is boring," said Rainbow Dash, "but if I can wait a couple of hours for the coolest ponies ever, then I think you can cool it for a few minutes."

Without even realizing it Rainbow Dash had increased in volume throughout that sentence, and had nearly shouted by the end of it. Mostly, Rainbow Dash was surprised to see Pinkie Pie ruining someone else's fun, as Pinkie Pie was normally sensitive about that sort of thing, especially with Fluttershy. Pinkie Pie stopped resisting, and Dash stopped dragging her. Pinkie Pie felt guilty. Everything about Rainbow Dash's demeanor and voice told her that she had crossed the line. She wasn't really sure how, though, but she could tell that Dash was serious. She had imagined all of her friends laughing at her silly antics and making the best of a bad situation but that isn't what happened at all. Pinkie Pie's voice became unusually lacking in energy as she replied, "I was just trying to have fun."

"Does Fluttershy look like she is having fun?" replied Dash cooly.

Pinkie Pie continued to puzzle over it but she could not think of what she had done wrong. To Pinkie Pie nothing felt worse than draining all the fun out of a situation, and not being sure how to fix it, or even why it happened. Her huge glassy eyes began to shake as they filled with more fluid then they could hold. They weren't overflowing yet, but it was obvious they were about to.

Everpony other then Rainbow Dash was too far away to notice and Rainbow Dash had caused the problem to begin with. Rainbow Dash let out a barely audible sigh as she knew this meant the responsibility fell on her, and this wasn't something she thought she was particularly good at. "Look Pink, there is nothing wrong with having fun, and being silly. We like you that way. You are one of the coolest ponies I have ever met. But sometimes when ponies are facing a problem, they don't want to celebrate or laugh to take their mind off of things. Sometimes they just want to deal with it, and during those times your normally charming antics just seem insensitive. So please just don't scare off all the animals Fluttershy wants so desperately to see."

"Oh is that what this is about!" exclaimed Pinkie Pie whose eyes had returned to their normal cheery state. Pinkie Pie continued, "I had thought we had given up on trying to get the animals to come out. If I had known we were still trying I wouldn't have done any of that. I better go apologize to Fluttershy." Then Pinkie Pie bounced away leaving Rainbow Dash speechless. Pinkie Pie was normally a pretty good listener, but she had become so absorbed in figuring out what she did wrong that that was the only part that got through.

Rainbow Dash was a bit upset she had gotten all mushy and stuff for no reason. Rainbow Dash felt like she had said some good things, and she really put her heart into those words which is not something she did very often. Oh well, at least everypony was happy now. Oh! And the Wonderbolts! Only a couple hours remained! Rainbow Dash couldn't believe she had let herself forget, even if only for a moment. Rainbow Dash flew back over to her friends, completely forgetting what had just happened.

"I'm sorry Fluttershy. I didn't mean to scare away the animals," said Pinkie Pie.

"I'm sorry too," responded Fluttershy.

"For what?" asked Twilight.

"I don't know. I guess I'm just used to apologizing for things," said Fluttershy.

They waited for thirty more minutes for animals to show up, and while Fluttershy couldn't even get near any of them they did see a few exotic creatures, including a buzzard that really buzzed. Fluttershy didn't see or get as close to the animals as she would have liked, but she couldn't help but be pleased with the way things turned out. She had matured, and not lost her mind just because some animals didn't love her yet. Furthermore, today she felt she had really made progress with the animals.

More importantly than any of that, her friends really showed how much they cared. Twilight raked her brain to help her figure out what was going wrong. Rainbow Dash had not only helped with Pinkie Pie, but had been surprisingly patient the whole time. Applejack used some of her homemade treats to try to coax the creatures out of hiding. Pinkie Pie had actually remained calm, which for her was quite a feat. Rarity trotted through some mud to give Fluttershy a better view of the animals. She felt better knowing she had nothing to be nervous about. Her friends didn't despise her for making them do something boring, but rather they relished the chance to show her what she meant to them. The nightmare Fluttershy had been having reoccurred to her but for once she laughed at it, as it seemed silly to her now.

Next on the schedule was Applejack. If Twilight had been thinking about it, she would have put her on the schedule second anyway, so as to be sure the Gala was still crowded when they were trying to make sales, but luckily even though Twilight forgot this, Applejack turned up second by the luck of the draw anyway.

Applejack handed all the ponies a bag of treats and said, "Now remember, the apple fritters are 3 bits, and the apple pies are 5 bits. Everything else is 2 bits."

Rainbow Dash interjected, "So if we aren't going to be spreading out, what is the point of all of us selling stuff again?"

"It's psychology Dash. The more ponies a pony sees selling a product, the more likely that pony is to view the products being sold as reliable and trustworthy," blurted out Twilight who was happy to have an excuse to recite an interesting fact she had learned in her studies. Her studies focused primarily on magic, but on occasion she found it beneficial to look into miscellaneous topics like running and psychology.

Applejack replied, "Right, what she said. More to the point you are a good friend and I'd appreciate the help. So you willing to give it or not? 'Cuz I don't want the help of no half-hearted ponies anyway"

"Did you forget who you are talking to AJ? Am I even capable of giving less than my best? Probably not, but I wouldn't know. I've never tried." said Rainbow Dash.

There was a brief silence that allowed the words of Pinkie Pie to reach the ears of the other ponies. "Well no, I'm not selling any cotton candy, but having this bag of food with me makes me wish I did, and that's why I was talking about it. Just think of how cool it would be if we were selling cotton candy," said Pinkie Pie to a now thoroughly uninterested pony who was walking away.

"Pink if you're going to talk to potential customers about food, could you please at least talk about food that we are actually selling?" sighed Applejack while removing the hoof she had just put to her forehead.

Pinkie Pie replied, "I was just trying to make some people hungry so that they would want to buy food. And think about it; which makes your mouth water more, plain old apple products, or cotton candy? Oh, or better still, chocolate rain! Wait, most ponies have never had chocolate rain, so they wouldn't know. Those poor ponies! I know I could help them by selling chocolate rain instead of boring apple..." Pinkie Pie trailed off, just realizing she probably shouldn't finish that sentence.

But then Applejack let out a laugh and said, "Yeah, I have to admit that next to chocolate rain, apple products do seem a little boring, but I'm not sure that's a bad thing. I don't think I'd want my products to be quite that 'interestin'."

Pinkie Pie had been recalling earlier when she had crossed the line, and momentarily let herself forget that her friends really do usually know how to have a little bit of fun. They didn't excel at it, per se, but that is what they had her for. She couldn't let the risk of occasionally stepping over a line here and there get in the way of teaching her friends the vitally important lesson of how to laugh. It was her element after all.

Ultimately, Applejack had far better sales than at her previous gala appearance, or at least she did percentage-wise. It was a 200% increase in sales, but it still was only a total of six sales. Most ponies present really did seem to look down on the products AJ was selling, but there were a few ponies who managed to slip through the cracks without having such a regal pallet. Each of them had appealed to customers in different ways, and each of them had managed to find precisely one pony who their style worked best on. Even Fluttershy, who was so unassertive one could scarcely tell she was selling anything, had a customer who bought something from her not because she liked the food, but simply because, "It is refreshing to see a sales pony who isn't trying to shove her product down my throat."

Really it just went to show how much more they could accomplish as a team, due to their unique talent and skills. While they still hadn't managed to sell much, it was impressive considering how long Applejack had worked last year only to get a single sale. Friendship was powerful and could accomplish things nopony could do alone, but like all things in life, it did have its limits. Even friendship couldn't give a pony good taste.

Rarity spoke concisely with a commanding voice, "Alright, Ladies. We have nice clothes, so now it is a matter of presentation, and presentation is everything. Keep your heads up high. Let us trot with dignity. By the time we are through, the prince will want all six of us, but he will know that his rudeness has ruined his chance with all of us."

Rarity had barely finished speaking when she rushed over to Applejack and began again, "No no, dahling, not like that. You aren't trying to pull some heavy anchor with your neck. This isn't a matter of work or power, but dignity and pride." It took Rarity a few minutes to get Applejack's posture the way she wanted it, which normally would have frustrated AJ, but it wasn't often Rarity got to go to an event this fancy, and though it felt like hours, it really was only a few minutes. Rarity proceeded to spend a few more minutes correcting various aspects of the posture of all the other ponies, until she got to Fluttershy.

"No no no, Fluttershy. Where is your sense of self worth?" demanded Rarity.

Fluttershy replied meekly, "But I'm weak and helpless and not worth very much. Is there anything in particular I am doing wrong?"

Rarity sighed and responded, "If only it were that simple. No, from a technique perspective you are doing everything right, but your self-doubt just seeps through your posture. One cannot excel at fabulosity without knowing how fabulous one is. This is why Rainbow Dash, despite her usual blatant disregard for posture, is actually doing the best. Come on, Fluttershy, we have told you repeatedly what a stupendous pony you are. Hasn't there ever been a time where you were proud of yourself?"

"Is being proud of yourself the same thing as not being disappointed in yourself? Because I have felt that... occasionally," mumbled Fluttershy.

Rarity slammed a hoof into her forehead. "Sadly, you have deeper confidence issues than we can solve in just one night. Just try to focus on one of those times when you weren't disappointed in yourself and that will have to do. For what it is worth, Fluttershy, I know you the best of anyone and honestly, I look up to you in many ways. However we have more pressing matters at the moment so we can discuss this more later."

With that the six ponies trotted their way inside the palace, where they were in view of the prince, and while their posture was far from perfect, it was not immediately apparent to any of the ponies there that these ponies did not come from high society. They formed a line and approached Prince Blueblood, then one by one, starting with Rarity, they stuck up their head higher than it was, closed their eyes, made a distinct noise of disdain, and walked off. They then proceeded to leave the palace.

"Thank you all for your help!" said Rarity.

"That was it?" blurted out a stunned Rainbow Dash, "We didn't do anything."

Rarity replied, "Didn't you see it? Plenty happened. First he looked at me, then away. Then he looked at the five of you, then back to me then away. Then he looked at the five of you, then away, then back to me, and then back to you. Then he looked..."

"Does any of this have a point?" interrupted Rainbow Dash.

Rarity replied, "Don't you know what that means? Clearly he wanted us oh so much, but at the same time knew he couldn't have us, but that only made him want us more. Being the prince he is, he has never been denied anything, and us slipping out of his grasp just completely destroyed him. Honestly I think we did our job a little too well."

"You could tell all of that just from a... No, you know what, it's time for the Wonderbolts!" exclaimed Rainbow Dash.

However Rainbow Dash was not really sure where the Wonderbolts would be. She had just sorta bumped into them last time and they weren't in that same place this time. The ponies wandered around the gala looking for them, until they saw a large crowd gathered, and in the middle were the Wonderbolts performing a show.

It took Dash's brain several seconds to believe the Wonderbolts were actually performing. She had always thought the gala was more the sort of event where one got to talk to the Bolts and get their autograph, but a live performance that just happened to be scheduled differently this year such that her and her friends all get to see it, was more than Dash's brain knew what to do with.

Rainbow Dash had wanted to see the Wonderbolts perform for her entire life. She had heard about it, but to her great shame she had never actually seen it before. She had even moved to Ponyville in hopes of seeing them perform during the Summer Sun Celebration, but whether it was Nightmare Moon showing up, or having to fly off to retrieve medicine for a sick Fluttershy, she had never gotten to go. She had arranged to see many of their shows over the years, but one way or another, not one of those opportunities panned out. But now here she was, with this opportunity she had spent a lifetime pursuing presenting itself to her out of the blue.

The stunts they performed where not anything like the moves Rainbow Dash had dreamed up. Their moves were more beautiful and thrilling than anything she had devised or could have imagined. She knew that being in the Wonderbolts was about speed and technique, but now she realized, it was also about synchronization. The way they all performed their moves at exactly the right time in relation to one another added a layer of awesomeness she could not have grasped without having seen it for herself. She had always thought that once she joined the Wonderbolts she would fit right in, but now she realized there would be months of training at the least, to teach her to breathe at the exact moment everypony else was breathing. Despite what a humbling realization this was, it somehow made her want to join that much more.

The show only lasted for another fifteen minutes, because apparently Rainbow Dash and her friends had arrived late to the show. Even Pinkie Pie remained quiet and still the whole time. Rainbow Dash's jaw had remained so low she had to fight drool back from dripping down her mouth. Though she had missed most of the show, at least she still had some time left for her friends and her to do what she wanted, so naturally they pursued the Wonderbolts. Dash figured her friends would catch up, and she couldn't waste any time she could spend talking to the Wonderbolts, so she took to the sky and flew toward them as quickly as she could. Rainbow Dash came to a stop right in front of Spitfire.

"Rainbow Dash, isn't it? Just the pony I was looking to see," said Spitfire.

"You wanted to see me?" said Rainbow Dash blankly.

There was silence for a while; then Spitfire swallowed hard and blurted out, "Don't join the Wonderbolts."

"What?" mumbled Rainbow Dash.

"Look, kid, I've seen enough of you to know you have the skill for it. But I see myself at your age when I look at you, and I ask for your own sake that you don't join," said Spitfire.

Rainbow Dash could not digest any of this. She had a hard enough time getting past the fact that one of her idols knew her name. Going from that to being praised by said idol for her skill, was too much excitement. Then the crushing weight of being told not to join, failed to cancel out the excitement of the first two, but instead made her confused, and gave her brain so much to process that it reached a grinding halt. She didn't know whether to celebrate or cry. "I don't understand," she mumbled.

"Yeah I wouldn't have either, and sadly no matter what I say you still won't, but I'll still try to clarify as best as I can. I owe you that much. I've been meaning to tell you this for a while: I was going to tell you last time I saw you at the Gala, but it is difficult to say.

The first year or so on the Wonderbolts you learn more about flying then you ever thought possible, but after that, well, you become so recognized, that ponies applaud no matter what you do. Once you can perform the routines without messing up, you find that there is no greater goal to strive for, and with the audience thinking you're great regardless, you become complacent.

I used to be like you and think there was no such thing as fast enough, but now the speed at which everyone else goes is the speed at which I go. Not only is there such a thing as fast enough, suddenly there is such a thing as too fast. Anymore I'm not as fast as I used to be because I don't need to be.

If you put on that suit and become one of us, then flying will be about whatever pleases the audience. If you don't, flying will remain about whatever pleases you and, honestly, no pony like us is ever pleased with her performance. You have more potential than anyone I have ever seen. So the question is do you want to be known as the best flier in Equestria, or do you want to be the best flier in Equestria?"

Rainbow Dash wanted to say "What?" but even in her cloud of confusion she was vaguely aware that this would sound dumb, so instead she continued staring blankly. This explanation had done little to set Rainbow Dash's mind at ease. Was she seriously supposed to just give up on her lifelong dream just like that? But at the same time, after hearing all that from someone who lived the dream, something about her dream seemed hollow. A hollow dream, or no dream, they were both empty, and now so was she.

She had a headache, and she wanted to throw up, but nothing would come. She had been so excited about the Wonderbolts she hadn't eaten anything all day, and now for the first time in her life, the Wonderbolts were the last ponies she wanted to see. She felt like taking off into the sky and not stopping for several hours, just to be far enough away from them, but she couldn't even move her wings. Yes of course, her wings were the problem. Maybe if she walked everywhere and just stopped using them they would fall off.

Just when she most wanted to be alone, Rainbow Dash's friends finally caught up with her. Somehow they knew instantly something was wrong.

"Why are you crying?" asked Twilight.

Rainbow Dash noticed that from her eyes to the bottom of her face did feel warmer than usual. She wiped at both her eyes, and sure enough her hoof was wet with tears. Rainbow Dash hadn't cried in so long she had forgotten what it was like.

"Oh dear! Even when I knew her as a young philly back in Cloudsdale, I never saw her cry. Something must really be wrong. Please, Rainbow Dash, tell us," pleaded Fluttershy.

Fluttershy looked so desperate, and there was no point in hiding it. Sooner or later they'd wonder why mentioning the Wonderbolts would make her cry instead of bring her excitement. Rainbow Dash said coolly or as much so as is possible for somepony who is crying, "The Wonderbolts said I was great, and that I should never join their team."

For a few seconds there was silence. None of them knew where to begin to console a hurt like this. Then Fluttershy went over and nuzzled rainbow dash a few times, and then stood beside her and wept. The other ponies decided to follow her lead, even Pinkie Pie.

"Come on, we'll walk you home," said Twilight Sparkle.

She did at some point want to talk this out with her friends, and lean on them for support, but now was not that time. All she wanted to do was go home as Twilight suggested, except she would actually have preferred to do it without her friends. But this was the gala, and her friends did not get to go very often. There were five ponies who, whether they would admit it or not, wanted to stay here and Pinkie Pie still hadn't gotten her turn at the schedule yet, so they were bound to have fun. If she left now, even if her friends stayed, no doubt they would just be thinking about her the rest of the night. No, as much as she wanted to, now was not the time to leave.

"We can deal with my problems later. Right now we have a gala to finish," said Rainbow Dash.

"Look Dash, we don't want to continue the gala if you're not going to be having any fun," said Twilight Sparkle.

"Applejack, do you feel like leaving the gala?" inquired Rainbow Dash.

"I agree with Twilight." said Applejack.

"That isn't what I asked. Do you feel like leaving the gala?" replied Rainbow Dash.

Applejack began to sweat bullets, which was exactly why Rainbow Dash asked her. "It's just some stupid fancy thing, and us country folk don't have any appreciation for fancy things anyway, right?" muttered Applejack unconvincingly. Rarity managed to suppress being offended, but only because AJ was so clearly lying.

"Look, please. While I appreciate what all of you are doing, there have been enough tears for one night. Let's just have some fun," pleaded Rainbow Dash. It felt weird making a case for exactly the opposite of what she wanted to do, but she felt so strongly about not disappointing her friends that in a way, she did want to stay more than she wanted to leave.

Twilight sighed and said, "Well alright then, but we are going to talk about this as soon as you feel ready."

Suddenly Rainbow Dash started to glow. It was a bright enough glow that a crowd of starring ponies were beginning to form around her, but not bright enough to hurt anypony's eyes. Then her lightning bolt necklace appeared around her neck.

"I've never heard of anything like that happening in my research. We should take you to see Princess Celestia," said Twilight.

"It doesn't hurt or anything so Princess Celestia can wait. Besides, it is Pinkie Pie's turn to decide what we do," insisted Rainbow Dash.

"Let's show these ponies how to party!" exclaimed Pinkie Pie.

Twilight considered rebuking Pinkie Pie for being so easily happy after what just happened to Rainbow Dash, but decided against it. She couldn't blame Pinkie Pie for being herself, especially not when Rainbow Dash kept encouraging them to have a good time anyway.

Pinkie Pie, with the help of her friends, changed the music, the menu, and had even set up some games. Where there had been caviar, instead there were cupcakes. Where there had been Pontoven's Third Symphony playing, instead "The Pony Poky" was playing. This time her friends didn't break in and break everything. Instead, she had their help, and so while most of the ponies stopped dancing and eating in protest, four joined in the festivities and even participated in games, like pin the tail on the pony. All-in-all it was a much smaller party within a larger "party" but even if it had been just her friends, Pinkie Pie would have had a good time. Even Rainbow Dash briefly forgot her troubles.

Everypony thought it was odd that Rainbow Dash was glowing, but those who were protesting such a lack of class were too busy sticking up their noses to pay her much attention, whereas those who were willing to participate in the party got used to it very quickly when they noticed Rainbow Dash herself was passing it off very light-heartedly. There were some gawkers who had followed her, but their gawking only continued for several minutes before they began to decide it wasn't that interesting and left.

Then, at last, came the part of the gala that Twilight had been waiting for. They went over to where Princess Celestia was. This time the room was far more crowded than before, as the line to see her filled the entire room. It made Twilight feel selfish but Rainbow Dash glowing seemed like the perfect excuse to cut in front of everypony, and thanks to Rainbow Dash's glowing nopony thought to question it. Perhaps they thought that Rainbow Dash was somehow related to Celestia or even a prop with the way she glowed like the sun. Or perhaps it was obvious that they needed Celestia's help to figure out what was going on. Regardless, Twilight was grateful for their luck, as they probably wouldn't get to see the princess before the gala ended otherwise.

Before Twilight and her friends stopped moving Princess Celestia said to them, "Hello Prized Pupil and friends. I am very proud of you, Rainbow Dash. I take it you wish to know why you are glowing?"

Rainbow Dash was floored by the way the princess didn't seem the least bit surprised by her glowing, and she wasn't used to being in the presence of royalty. Further, her pride had been completely shattered and so, for once in her life, Rainbow Dash spoke so softly it was barely audible. "Uh... yeah," she said.

"Well sadly I have a lot of people to greet, but my sister Princess Luna knows more about the Elements of Harmony than I do. She is actually very knowledgeable about most everything... except for the last thousand years. That is part of the reason I took you on as my prized pupil, Twilight. Your studious nature and potential that extends far beyond what you know, reminded me of her," said Celestia.

"Where is Princess Luna?" inquired Twilight.

"She is right beside..." started Princess Celestia, but upon looking over and seeing her sister absent she decided to pause. She then continued by saying, "Well I'm sure she is around the palace somewhere, and I do not have time to find her, so I leave it to you."

Twilight, taking to heart what the princess had said about her being similar to Princess Luna, headed straight for the library, with her friends following slightly behind her, and sure enough, there she was. It took a while to navigate through the crowd, but they managed to squeeze into one of the few nearby rooms with no one in it, and from there proceeded to the library, where it was just them and the princess.

"Princess Luna, why aren't you greeting guests with your sister? You are just as much a princess as she is, after all," asked Twilight.

Princess Luna replied in a voice that was thankfully much quieter than the royal Canterlot voice, "My sister tries so hard to include me in everything, but I just don't belong out there. I have always been more of one for books, and solitude, whereas she has always excelled more at action and interacting with the public. A thousand years has done nothing more than cement that. I try to humor Celestia, but in the end I just feel out of place. However, I assume you are here about your glowing friend and not to talk about my troubles?"

"Well, yes, but before we switch topics to that, I would just like to say that I understand where you are coming from, as I have never been one to hang out with ponies all day long either. However, even though I thought I didn't, I have learned that everyone needs friends," replied Twilight.

"Very well, Twilight, I shall give having a friend a try. Come back here tomorrow night at eight O'clock. That is, unless you are already busy," said Princess Luna.

Twilight couldn't believe a princess, especially one who was at least a thousand years older than her, could want to be friends with her. She wanted to ask Princess Luna if she was sure, but she thought this might sound too much like Twilight didn't want to be her friend. Twilight stammered, "Errr... Sure, that works well."

"Great! Now that that is settled, your friend is glowing because she is strongly exemplifying her element, and thus the spirit of her element is temporarily more strongly tied to her body. Simply put, your friend is being loyal at a time during which it is difficult for her to be so and, consequently, she is for a time a Super Element of Harmony," replied Princess Luna.

"A Super Element of Harmony?" inquired Twilight.

"Yes, there are a lot of obscure books written on the theory behind it, but really the only noticeable side effect aside from the glowing, is any spells she casts while in this state will be much more powerful than normal," said Princess Luna.

"So it has no effect on pegasus ponies like her who can't cast spells?" asked Twilight.

"Who can't cast spells? I think we both know that is a lie. From my understanding she has cast a spell at least twice. Though you should know that better than I as all six of you were involved in the casting of said spells. Like the time you cast that memory spell on me for example," said Luna.

"Wait, wait, we cast a memory spell on you? I thought we just sorta hit you with pure awesome causing the evil in your heart to melt away," interjected Rainbow Dash. Twilight would have been ashamed to admit it, as she realized how foolish her understanding of events sounded out loud, but she had been thinking the same thing.

"What? No, you reminded me of all the good times I had had with my sister, and what a wonderful pony she was. It was a particularly strong memory spell, as it needed to be, for I had been under Discord's influence for far longer than any of you," said Princess Luna.

"As in chocolate rain Discord?" inquired Pinkie Pie.

"I'm not sure I know what you mean by that, but if memory serves, the one and only Discord does have a fondness for chocolate rain," responded Luna.

"So you were just under Discord's spell just like we were?" asked Applejack.

"Well, more or less. No offense, but my will is a bit stronger than that of you ponies, so he had to do a lot of manipulation for it to work. But in time, with his coaxing, I began to resent my sister," said Luna.

"But I thought you two banished Discord together, well before you became Nightmare Moon," said Twilight

"Oh, I guess I forgot to mention that the bit of Discord that was coaxing me was inside of me. You see, I actually reached Discord a few seconds before my sister did. Discord knew immediately that I was a threat to him, so he hit me with a surprise attack, in which he put a small part of himself in me, which is exactly what he did to you. It's just since I had a stronger will, it took much longer for him to finally gain control. Thankfully powerful thoughts about the bonds one shares with another, like those generated by your memory spell, have a way of banishing Discord," said Luna.

"So has Equestria, ever had any enemies other than Discord?" asked Twilight.

"Now you are asking a very interesting question. One that I have spent much time researching, and the answer is yes, but back in those days it was called Earth," said Luna. Luna warned, "I haven't been able to figure out everything, but I have been able to piece together a lot so it's kinda a long story. Would you like to hear it?"

Twilight looked toward Rainbow Dash, who nodded in approval. "Yes, please," responded Twilight.

Luna said, "Long ago, the predominant intelligent life on this planet were creatures known as humans. In these days they had mere animals known as ponies on their farms and such, but these creatures could not talk, or do magic, or reason beyond what simple animals can. But then one day, ponies more like the ones we are appeared. They were beings of complete illogic though, so their origins made no sense, and neither did their language. They were able to communicate and get things done, yet the manner in which they went about doing so had no logical backbone whatsoever.

This was completely different from the humans, who were beings that needed and thrived on logic. Not all of them were good at it, but this was just another logical trait of their existence. Magic was the sort of thing that many of them wanted to believe in, but ultimately as a whole they couldn't accept. Instead they developed their own form of magic out of logic, known as science. This science would manifest itself in various devices known as technology."

"Technology?" stammered a befuddled Twilight.

"Our trains are a perfect example of something that is believed to have been inspired by their technology, but theirs actually ran by themselves, with the power of logic and physics, instead of using pony power.

The point is, their whole lives were dependent upon a notion of logic far deeper than exists in the world as we know it today. They were the complete opposite of the ponies that had started appearing.

Despite this, something about the two intelligent beings having to share this world caused them to slowly become more and more like each other. In time, ponies started developing some amount of logic and confined their illogic to magic. Eventually even magic would develop logical outcomes, and predictable results, but the logic was still never as pure as their science. Likewise, the humans' science became less like science and began to border on magic. Over thousands of years, the two beings even began to look like one another... until eventually a completely in between state was formed, the humanoid pony. Naturally, since they are the only kind of pony that exists anymore, today we just call them ponies for short.

However there were humans and ponies alike who were dissatisfied with the way they both seemed to be headed to some kind of in-between form. Those ponies ended up fusing into one being of complete illogic and disharmony known as Discord. The humans, on the other hoof, formed a single large army known as Logos. They both wanted to destroy any contact ponies and humans had, and especially the humanoid ponies. However, the two beings were so opposite in every other way that they first sought to destroy each other. Logos imprisoned Discord in something rumored to be called a black hole. I haven't been able to find much information on that, so it's hard to say for sure.

Discord would, of course, later abuse the fact that he is a being of pure illogic to escape from said object of science, but something about time compression and faster than light caused him to be several thousand years in the future. When Discord came back to rule Earth, he found that it was now a place composed entirely of humanoid ponies who had long since banished Logos, and it was known as Equestria. It is unknown how, when, or who banished Logos, but it is believed by numerous scholars that Ever Free Forest was sacrificed to be forever governed by their logic, in order to banish them to some alternate dimension. Some ponies think that Ever Free Forest remains the connection between our world and theirs to this day. Personally I don't think they have forgotten, and they still seek to destroy us and reclaim this world that they feel we stole from them."

"Destroy us?" said Twilight.

"Yes, that is something I forgot to mention. The other main difference between humans and ponies was violence. As you have noticed we have adopted some level of that from them as well, or else there would be no bullying, and no fighting, but that is not the case. Thankfully we do not have the terrible breach of harmony known as murder," said Luna.

"Wow, I have heard of that, but I always just thought it was a theoretical concept. I didn't think it had ever actually occurred," said Twilight.

"Oh, it has occurred, and though Celestia disagrees, something tells me that if we are not careful, it will occur again. I believe this tablet was somehow sent by them, but no matter how much I study it, I cannot figure out what it means," said Luna.

They looked at the cracking slab with moss growing over it, and Twilight's eyes shifted over it as though she were reading it aloud, "We are Logos. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us."

"You can read that?" questioned Luna.

"Yes. I'm not sure why, but I am positive that is what it says," replied Twilight.

For a moment everypony gaped at Twilight, yet they all knew Twilight wouldn't lie to them about this. There were many questions that filled their minds, but they were sure Twilight didn't know either. Luna was the first to interrupt the silence.

"Then it is as I feared, they are seeking to reclaim their Earth, and they sent this hundreds of years ago as a threat. They cannot get people or technology over to our world yet it would seem, but given how long it has been, and that they did get this message, it could well be soon. I'll tell my sister, but there is little we can do," sighed Luna.

With that, all of the ponies departed from the gala, their minds troubled; either because of the Wonderbolts and dreams crushed, or because of this foreboding feeling that was beginning to swoop over them all, that the time Luna feared was coming all too soon.


	2. Chapter 2: Twilight Sparkle Who?

**And Then There Were Ponies Chapter 2: Twilight Sparkle Who?**

Twilight forced her heavy eyes open, but even still they only opened enough that anything not directly in front of her gaze appeared blurry. For once, she was hoping it was late and that she had slept in. But no, only an hour had passed since she last looked at the clock, as she had done an hour before that.

Twilight awoke the morning after the Gala much like she had fallen asleep, with no shortage of issues plaguing her mind. She was not even sure sleep was the right term for it. Something about it felt vaguely restful, but she was still painfully aware of each minute slowly ticking by. Her worries even managed to keep her from focusing very long on the misery they had caused.

Was Rainbow Dash going to be okay? She was a strong pony, but she had always been obsessed with the Wonderbolts. More troubling still was the fact that Equestria could be in great danger. It could be millennia before humans figure out how to exact their revenge, or it could be today.

But now something new troubled Twilight's mind that she had been too busy worrying about those other two things to think about: why did she know that language and what did it mean? Twilight had spent many years studying magic, and there was nothing she knew of that could teach a pony a language. Even if such a spell existed wouldn't the pony who cast it on her have to actually know said language, and what pony could possibly know the language of beings they have had virtually no contact with for thousands of years?

She hated to think it, but the most reasonable explanation that Twilight could think of was that there was some part of her past she couldn't remember for some reason, in which she learned it. Had she somehow crossed the dimensions and lived, yet somehow stayed long enough to learn their language? How could such a gaping hole exist in her memory? The more Twilight thought about it, the more she felt as though she didn't know who she was anymore.

This wasn't the first time Twilight had called a fact to mind that she couldn't remember ever having learned. These weren't rare occurrences, nor where they just a simple matter of having forgotten which book she read something in. There were a number of things that she could almost swear she had always known. This was part of what made her so fascinated with magic as a filly, because she never had any of those awkward moments of realizing she already knew something when studying magic, which made her question how she knew so much. She had all but forgotten it, but growing up, this feeling of not knowing who she was, was common. But never had the feeling been this intense, and neither had she ever known anything as large as an entire language.

It wasn't even as if she only knew the basics of said language. Now that she had remembered it, she could speak and think in it fluently at will. She even knew common spelling mistakes, and grammatical errors.

This could wait though, as all of Equestria might be in peril. She didn't have much to go on, but she knew that Everfree Forest had something to do with all this, so it seemed like a logical place to start. She would need the help of her friends though, so maybe she could help cheer up Rainbow Dash along the way. Twilight briefly considered waking Spike, but it looked as though he had stayed up late celebrating the increase in membership, so she left without disturbing him.

When Twilight arrived at Dash's place she found that Fluttershy, and Rarity had already beaten her there, but it didn't appear they had gotten there much sooner, as Fluttershy was just now knocking on the door.

"You're going to have to knock louder than that, dear," called out Rarity.

Fluttershy hated knocking on doors. It just seemed so barbaric and violent. Hadn't they invented doorbells for a reason? She knew the door wasn't really alive, but still she couldn't justify giving it a good whack when it had done nothing to her. She hit it with her hoof once more a little harder, but the sound it made was still barely audible.

Rainbow Dash then bolted out of the sky, coming from the opposite direction of her house, and landed right in front of Twilight. "Are you ponies looking for me?" she asked.

"I just thought I would drop by, and give you my Mane Mangler 3000. It's the latest in mane design, and the whole fashion world is buzzing about it. I know that generally isn't something you'd have much interest in, but I thought a new look, might brighten your mood a little. I know it always brightens mine," said Rarity.

"While I appreciate you giving me your... fashion thing, I don't need it. So the Wonderbolts system is flawed. That just means I'll have to be so awesome, it's clear I'm the leader and I can change the rules. Then I'll change the system so that all ponies have to constantly become faster to stay on the team. The old goal I choose of just joining the Wonderbolts was too easy, and I became too awesome for it, so I came up with a new goal for me to become too awesome for. When things don't go the way I wanted or dreamed them to, I just become more awesome. That is why I was practicing," said Rainbow Dash.

"So you really don't need any help? Because if you need to talk, I am really good at listening." said Fluttershy.

"Thanks, but I should probably get back to practicing soon. I really am cool with it. I was bummed at first, but then I realized self pity is stupid, and that surpassing my dream really just further demonstrates how awesome I am," said Rainbow Dash.

"Well I'm glad that this experience hasn't done anything to minimize your ego," mumbled Twilight with a hint of sarcasm, completely forgetting why she had come in the first place.

"Relax. If I'm cooler than I realized then my friends must be as well, right? I don't hang out with anypony that I am more than 20% cooler than," said Dash.

"Now that Rainbow Dash seems to be back to her normal self, perhaps we should go to Everfree Forest, to hopefully find out more about this potential threat. Why don't we gather the remainder of our friends and begin investigating? I am sure we will be safe if we all stick together," said Twilight.

"Oh you mean the 'threat' which barely managed to get a rock over to us," snickered Rainbow Dash.

"This isn't a laughing matter. For all we know, they could arrive today," responded Twilight.

"While I don't think it is a laughing matter, I have to agree with Rainbow Dash. Why go looking for trouble? If trouble finds us then we will use the elements of Harmony, but until such time there simply isn't anything to worry about; Well, aside from your mane that is," said Rarity. She then promptly began inserting bits of Twilight's hair into the mane mangler.

Rarity had only meant to help, but Twilight couldn't help but blush. In all of her panic and confusion, she had completely forgotten about hygiene. This is something that she had mostly managed to overcome as she grew older, but occasionally she would find that she had spent days, instead of hours reading and researching, but never had she gone outside immediately after, and having her occasional forgetfulness in regard to such personal matters being pointed out to everypony didn't help.

However, this feeling of embarrassment passed quickly as she remembered the more urgent reason as to why she was here. Twilight said, "What about you Fluttershy?"

"Everfree Forest," repeated Fluttershy. She then instinctively let out an "eep!" sound, covered her head with her hooves, and began quivering. Fluttershy was never known for her bravery, but that response came to her more quickly with Everfree Forest then most things.

Twilight sighed heavily as she could feel precious time dying. Having to convince everypony would take too long. If she at least knew somepony else who was willing to go, maybe she could try to win them over, but at this rate she wasn't convinced it would ever happen. She needed to know what these beings were, when they were coming, and who she was, and the only clue she had to go on was Everfree Forest. "Fine I'm going without you then," said Twilight, as she trotted off

"Hey I'd never leave a pony hanging, even if you are being stubborn. Actually, stubborn isn't a bad look for you," said Rainbow Dash who promptly caught up to Twilight, and who was now effortlessly keeping pace with her.

Rarity's voice called after them, "Wait for me."

They stopped for a couple seconds, and that was long enough for the white mare to catch up with them.

"I brushed off something that was important to you once before, and as your friend I don't intend on doing it again," said Rarity. She continued "But I must ask, what exactly are you hoping to find?"

"I don't know. It stands to reason that if what Luna said was true, then there should be some sort of relic or clue around somewhere. Perhaps something left by our ancestors, to let us know what sort of spell they used, or maybe some artifact, which is actively keeping the banishment spell in effect," replied Twilight as they began to pick up their pace again.

No pony ever heard Fluttershy call quietly after them, "I'll be here if you find anything. Actually, if you do find anything, could you just tell me about it later?"

They found Apple Jack working the farm as usual. Twilight called out to her, "We are going to go check out Everfree Forest for clues about humans. Do you want to come with us?"

Apple Jack knew this was a bad idea, but seeing three of her friends about to trot into potential danger made it hard to say no. "We are a few days ahead on apple picking anyway, so I'll be there in a jiffy," said Apple Jack, who trotted over toward them after knocking apples off a couple more trees.

They were on their way to Sugar Cube Corner when Pinkie Pie just started bouncing along beside them. "So where are we going anyway?" inquired Pinkie Pie.

"Everfree Forest," answered Twilight.

Pinkie Pie proceeded to make a sound not unlike when Twilight first said hi to her, but she followed it by saying, "Everfree Forest! But, but..." Pinkie Pie then proceeded to sing, "She's an evil enchantress who does evil dances..."

"Pinkie, we already know Zecora is a good person," said Twilight.

"I know, but I haven't gotten to use that song in a while, and it has a certain ring to it," replied Pinkie Pie. Then suddenly Pinkie Pie's face illuminated with excitement. "You don't suppose we could convince Zecora to actually be an evil enchantress, to better fit my song do you! Then I could sing it all the time, and maybe it'd become a hit at Nightmare Night parties!" exclaimed Pinkie Pie.

Twilight could almost kick herself for saying this but she couldn't seem to stop herself in time before blurting out, "But having parties on Nightmare Night, would mean not collecting free candy."

"Saying no to free candy! Do we know each other at all? The parties would be on other nights close to Nightmare Night, duh," said Pinkie Pie.

The ponies wandered around for hours, without finding anything. Twilight almost suggested they split up to cover more ground, but she could hear them all shooting down that idea in unison before she even said anything. There were a number of complaints, many of which from Rarity, but they were things they were all thinking. It was getting dark and not one of them had eaten anything since breakfast. Twilight had tried to keep morale up, and was constantly reassuring them that they would find something soon.

"Twilight, sugar cube, I appreciate that you want to figure this out, but we have been out here for hours, and I just don't think we are gonna find anything. 'Sides, don't ya have a meetin' with Princess Luna in a couple hours?" said Apple Jack.

Twilight sighed, finally conceding, "You are right. This was a dumb idea. I'm sorry for wasting your time, everypony."

"It's chill. At least now we know there is nothing out here. Besides, I got to practice a few tricks, while waiting for you to catch up," said Rainbow Dash.

"Yes, well..." began Rarity also trying to look for a bright side, "at least we did get to spend the day together, so I did not muddy my hooves for nothing."

"Besides isn't it a good thing we didn't find nuthin'? Maybe that means those old fables are nothing but a bunch of hogwash," said Apple Jack.

"Evil enchantress who gives evil glances?" mumbled Pinkie Pie to herself, trying to work the second verse. "Oh sorry, were we talking about something?" inquired Pinkie Pie.

Twilight couldn't believe none of them seemed to think this was important, or even real. It was as if being able to speak some language none of them had ever seen before didn't even make an impression on them. As if it just somehow made sense, because she was the "smart" one of the group, and that her identity was in her ability to know things, even things she shouldn't know. Twilight looked down in disappointment, but a single familiar letter caught her eye.

She took her hooves, and wiped the dust away from more of the shiny smooth surface, and saw more letters of the language she shouldn't know.

"What did you find?" demanded Rainbow Dash.

"I don't know. It looks like the rest of the letters are on parts of it that are buried, and the letters I can see, don't say anything by themselves. I am positive this is something else the humans sent though," said Twilight.

The ponies all rushed over to help dig it up, but none of them got the chance to do any digging, as Twilight, moved massive clumps of dirt really quickly, with her magic. Before them was a strange device made completely of steel, that was twice as tall as the ponies would be if they stood on two legs. It was barely recognizable as steel through the thick coating of rust, and there were several holes in it varying in size, from one a pencil might make, to one that was the diameter of a cup. Despite its extremely beat up look, it still had a discernible structure to it. It had two tank-like treads that were where it's feet would be, and had two arms, each with long hollow tubes mounted on them. The inscription Twilight had caught a glimpse of earlier was on its forehead and it read, "Warning: Failure to properly program this device may result in death or dismemberment."

"What is that thing?" asked RD.

"That is an InterGalactic destruction unit or IDU for short. It is a multipurpose unit, whose primary function is killing enemies, but is also capable of storing exabytes of data and has state of the art artificial intelligence systems. I would be happy to schedule a short demonstration, but it requires at least two months notice, as these models are very popular," instinctively blurted out Twilight.

All the ponies' mouths were agape, but it was Apple Jack who first broke the silence. "Come again?" she said.

"I don't know," said Twilight, who was looking very intently at the ground. "I didn't mean to say that, but I couldn't help myself. It is as if I have said it a lot before. I know this must sound crazy, but I do know what this thing is, and these tubes have got to go, as they are weapons," Twilight proceeded to rip them off with her magic.

"Wow, Twilight, I always thought I was the only one who had Pinkie sense, but your Pinkie sense is way cooler than mine. Or maybe I should call it Twilight sense, unless you've decided you want to be Pinkie Pie too, but that would be way too confusing," said Pinkie Pie.

"Being able to read a new language I can deal with, but you knowing so much, is creepy. Are you sure you don't recall where you learned any of this?" asked Apple Jack.

"No. My best clue for figuring this out is to try to reactivate this unit. It is so beat up and I've never tried this spell on a robot before, so I don't know if this will work, but I have to try," answered Twilight. She had recently been working on a spell that would awaken sleeping or unconscious ponies, and would even cause inanimate objects to bounce around. It wasn't really that similar to what she wanted to accomplish but it was the closest thing she could think of, so she began to cast a spell very similar to that one.

"Here goes nothing," muttered Twilight, as she touched her horn to the ugly hunk of junk.

After a few seconds, one of the robot's eyes began to glow a dim red. "You are lucky, that the chips related to my AI functionality are still intact or else your spell would have done nothing, Dr. Beta. Regardless you have bought me but a little time, as my power supply is almost depleted," said the robot in a quiet voice that was rapidly switching pitches, and almost sounded as if it was gasping for breath.

Twilight felt silly for having removed his weapons as she was now positive he was too weak and deteriorated to be able to use them anyway. But she didn't waste much time feeling silly as she was overwhelmed that there actually was a valid clue. She didn't want to be so happy, as this was almost assuredly a robot from the people who wanted them dead, but her curiosity made it impossible. Her eyes and face in general shifted to how Pinkie Pie looks when drinking chocolate rain. There was so much to say, she didn't know where to begin, but she wanted her questions to be as relevant to the current conversation as possible, so she started by blurting out, "Dr. Beta?"

"Indeed, my visual scanners didn't recognize you, as it seems they have made you one of them. Fear not though as I have other means of identification and you are indeed Dr. Beta. I am guessing they took away your memory as well, so I suppose I should tell you that you are a human, and one of the most brilliant scientists we have ever had. Unfortunately you volunteered to enter this dimension along with many of your creations and a vast army, an overwhelming majority of which were completely destroyed in transit. It seems those who didn't die were made into ponies, and had their memories taken from them as you have, though honestly my calculations indicate that you are most likely the only one who survived, and I am probably the only robot who is even slightly functional," replied the robot.

Twilight didn't know what to say. This thing sent by the humans had offered the most reasonable explanation for why she knew these things that she had never heard or thought of, but it was still so absurd. Didn't the humans want revenge, yet she never felt any urge to harm any of her friends. Further, how had she become a pony? Could magic really do something like that? And why was this robot by the humans who wanted them dead so much friendlier then she had expected. Though it was clearly weak, she had expected it to at least try to kill them, or maybe open some portal for the humans to get through. Twilight was at such a loss for words that she just stared at it for a few moments. It was awkward and she was so curious that she couldn't excuse herself for not asking it questions so she uttered something that even sounded stupid in her head, "I'm a human?" She immediately regretted asking it. It would surely think she was a moron if that was all she managed to understand of what it just said. But her regret quickly faded as at least her words evoked a response.

"Honestly, I was rather hoping you had gathered that much from your unexplained knowledge of our language and other unexplained knowledge you must have. Research indicates that even magic has difficulty removing knowledge from a brain, without damaging it severely and irreparably. Perhaps their brainwashing is far more powerful then we realized," said the robot.

Yes, brainwashing. That was a perfect cover for why she had given such a stupid response. Twilight instantly latched on to this topic, and said the first thing that came to her mind. "Brainwashing? What pony could possibly be powerful enough to turn me into a pony and brainwash me other than..." trailed off Twilight Sparkle.

"Princess Celestia. Exactly," said the robot.

Rainbow Dash started to say, "What kind of stupid idiotic..." when a white hoof pressed against her mouth muffled her words.

Rarity interrupted, "It would seem Rainbow Dash is busy being stunned at the moment, so I suppose it falls to me, to remind you it is rude to carry on a conversation around us in a language we don't know, without telling your friends what you are talking about."

It was then that Twilight realized they had been having this conversation in the one human language she knew the whole time. Not only had she not realized this, but she had forgotten that her friends were with her. She looked around at them, trying to think of what to say, as she herself still had no idea what is going on. It had said she was human, but could she really believe that, especially after the way it just accused Princess Celestia.

"Don't worry, they're not really your friends anyway," said the robot.

A single bit of misinformation, from a robot whose sources of information were likely highly biased, Twilight could tolerate, but having every pony she respected most being put down was too much. If it had started with these insults she probably wouldn't have thought much of it, but she had pitied it, felt embarrassed around it, and had been even starting to trust it, and so her cheeks turned a bright red.

"And who asked you?" shouted Twilight back at it. "These ponies have always been there for me, when I needed them!" she continued.

"Really? And if you trust them so much, why do you hesitate to tell them what you have discovered? Why have you not told them that you are a human, and not a pony? Could it be, that being the rational person you are, you know as well as I do, they would turn against you if they learned the truth. Friendship is magic? Elements of Harmony? It's all a lie, to control you. Celestia kept you around instead of killing you, not out of a sense of mercy, but because she knew your knowledge would be helpful in destroying humanity, which has always been her goal, so she has cleverly devised all this to make you as loyal as possible, so that when the inevitable contact between you and humanity occurred, as it now is, your emotions would cloud your judgment. But don't let them. You are smarter than that, Dr. Beta. You can't let yourself be fooled. You can't let them turn you against your own kind. You must know it is so. Haven't you always felt a bet different? More logical then even the most studious of their kind?"

Twilight had streams of tears running from both cheeks that were so hot they burned as they dripped down her face. Rainbow Dash, Rarity and the others were more curious then ever what was being said, but it was apparent to them that Twilight was hurting, so they didn't dare ask yet what was happening. They gathered close to Twilight and stared intently and menacingly at the robot, as it was all they could think to do for the mean time.

Twilight didn't notice this act of kindness though, as her head was throbbing. She was so confused. She knew the robot had to be lying, but she still ached. Her hooves felt like they were on fire supporting her weight and her stomach was threatening to renounce food forever and send anything it received right back out. Despite all this she could still yell. In fact, she wasn't sure if she was capable of speaking any other way. "Why should I believe a thing you have said?" shouted Twilight.

"Because you know I am right, otherwise you wouldn't be so worked up. Think about it. Who among the ponies have given you a remotely reasonable explanation for why you know these things, or has given you any explanation at all. You think of us as the enemy, but why? Because we sent an army in hopes of destroying Celestia, before she destroyed us? Do you think she hasn't tried similar things, only with greater success? Or is it perhaps because of some supposed message we sent. We have been battling her for thousands of years, so naturally she has picked up on enough of our language to fake that. How many prized pupils do you suppose she has had? Hint: has she ever mentioned any previous pupils? Isn't that such an interesting coincidence that you should be her first and an element of harmony as well?"

Twilight retorted, "Even if I were to assume that my mentor is as selfish and violent as you, what could she possibly have to gain, from destroying you?"

"Come now Twilight, you don't have to ask me anymore. I am confident we are getting to the point where, whether you'll admit it or not, you know the answers to these questions already. Do you really believe Luna's version of how things came to be? No, ponies did not just come to being randomly. They existed already on a distant planet. However, the world they lived on was barely habitable, so they came to earth and they stole it from us. They would have killed us all, but we had them severely outnumbered, as there weren't many ponies yet. Instead they banished us to a different world, and stole our earth from us. Ponies finding out that their home world was stolen, would be a public relations nightmare, and so it only stands to reason that she would want us all dead, as we are the only evidence of this great sin that has been committed," said the robot.

Twilight searched desperately for any holes in the logic of the robot. He had to be lying and if he was, he was bound to have slipped up somewhere. Twilight said coolly, though she still felt terrible, "Before you just start spouting off lies, I recommend you get your story straight. First you accuse my friends, then Celestia, and now you say that normal ponies, like my friends, don't actually know anything about the truth, and it is a giant cover up?"

"It was painful to see you make such a desperate and illogical attempt to continue believing what you want to believe, instead of what makes sense. Do you even remember what it is I accused your friends of? I accused them of not being able to handle the truth of you being a human, as assuredly almost no pony could. They instinctively seem to have an unnatural aversion to our kind. They are just normal ponies, and thus have nothing to do with the atrocities Celestia has committed," said the robot.

Twilight had to really concentrate to restrain herself from visibly face-hoofing. She was in a rush and desperate, but still she was ashamed to admit such half-baked logic had come out of her mouth, and every mistake she made, made its arguments seem more plausible. She couldn't accept that. Even though she knew it was lying, this was one argument she had to win. Truth should always prevail over fallacy in an argument. It only made sense. Then she almost felt her head burst, from the enormity of the idea that just birthed itself from her head. Of course! "If things really are as you say, how is it you know so much? You know about me, the elements of harmony, Princess Celestia, and even my friends? If you are really pitiful humans facing off against a powerful tyrant, how do you know so much? It almost sounds like you have been stalking me, in order to carefully craft your lies in the most effective manner possible," said Twilight with a smirk, a glare of confidence, and all four legs planted firmly on the ground.

"Even if I were in any shape to, remember that you did just reactivate, very temporarily, a badly damaged robot. If you aren't Dr. Beta, why would I have any reason to follow you, as you have implied? One could argue that I could have because you are one of the elements of harmony, but unless I were following you already, how would I know that? If you are Dr. Beta, then the question still remains why are you now a pony and don't you remember your previous humanity, to which the most logical answer is, because of Celestia, which points to her being evil, and in which case why do you really doubt anything I have said? As for how I knew all this already, there is a far simpler explanation. What is true of your friends is true of all ponies. We didn't have much time to study their aversion to humans but we did have enough to learn of its intensity. The transition process actually allowed me to "hear" much that was said before firmly materializing in Everfree Forest, thus giving me basic knowledge of the elements of harmony, and friendship is magic. As for Celestia and her manipulation, that is just basic knowledge from what we know of her character and the fact that my sensors indicate you are indeed Dr. Beta. After all, how could we not know of her character with the slaughtering of us she has done, and the secret egomaniac she is? She even spelled out her own name in our blood, because she wanted us to have no doubts it was her. As much as I would love to continue debating this matter with you, I meant it when I said my power supply wouldn't last long, so I need to give this to you before it is completely depleted. I know you don't exactly have a computer to view its data with, but one of your spells should work," said the robot.

The robot took his hand and pierced through his own chest with it, and then removed a hard drive. He handed it to Twilight, and before Twilight finished deciding whether or not to take it, its eye ceased glowing. Twilight was so frustrated by this. She almost had a strong finish to that argument but that robot had a valid rebuttal to everything she said. She knew she was right, but she still wanted to win, as truth should. She was right... wasn't she? The grass, dirt, and metal, began to blur together for a moment, but then her vision returned to normal. Of course she was right! Her understanding of things just made more sense, because it did!

Despite her newfound confidence, when Twilight took the hard drive from its hand her head began throbbing worse than ever. On the bright side she couldn't even feel her stomach or her hooves anymore. Her head was throbbing so much that she wasn't sure if the pain in those body parts ceased, or if she just couldn't feel it anymore over the throbbing of her head.

"What happened?" asked Rainbow Dash, with her jaw still wide open.

"Uh, he was lost, and wanted some directions," replied Twilight who was hurting too much to even realize how stupidly unconvincing her lie was. "Anyways, I gotta go do stuff, or something," continued Twilight, who wanted nothing more than to go over this alone in her library, before running off. There was just something about libraries that she still associated with peace, and with her head hurting the way it did, and the events of the day in general, peace sounded really good about now.

"How dare Twilight, act like she wanted to be friends, and an hour and a half later, she still has not shown up! We have had a hard enough time making friends without Twilight making a mockery of us!" Princess Luna thought so angrily that she thought it aloud. After a few seconds, she sighed, and said to herself, "No, Twilight is the only one who has been so understanding. I must assume the best of her until I have good reason to think otherwise. I'm just letting my nerves get the better of me as I have not made a friend in a very long time."

Luna was not in the habit of talking to herself, but when she was particularly angry she had a hard time stopping herself, and once she started talking to herself it was hard to stop. What if somepony heard her say something stupid while angry, and she never spoke aloud more reasonably for said pony to see her retract her statement.

The carriage she had been riding in suddenly stopped. A sharp voice then called out, "We have arrived at Twilight Sparkle's library, Princess." Ever since Twilight had helped her learn how normal people talk these days, it annoyed Luna the way royal guards always spoke to her in a sharp, curt, concise way, as if they had just been punched in the stomach. Maybe the guard training program was one of the few things that hadn't changed in the past thousand years, but ever since that day, Luna couldn't shake the feeling that they only spoke that way around her.

She tried to clear her mind of such needlessly negative thoughts as she trotted over to and banged on Twilight's door. Several seconds passed before she hit the door again, perhaps more out of aggression against the door for refusing to permit her entry, than to summon Twilight. After a few more seconds the door swung open, and Twilight stood on the other side of it.

"Well I see you haven't died, so your excuse can't be that good," said Luna as she proceeded to trot right into Twilight's house. Luna's mouth rested halfway between a smile and a displeased glare, as she was still trying to decide if she was seriously upset or if she was joking.

"No, I have something that is far better than dying!" exclaimed Twilight, barely managing to pry the words out of her huge smile, while bouncing around in a manner similar to Pinkie Pie. Despite this, her pupils were strangely small, and her mane looked as though it hadn't been brushed in months.

"Behold logic in its purest form!" continued Twilight with one hoof extended toward a bunch of symbols floating in the air. Some of the symbols looked like the ones on that rock; however something was distinctly different about their arrangement here. There were some lines that only contained a single symbol, and often after such lines the indentation would change.

"Um..." began Luna. Luna had never seen letters floating in the air before, especially not in a foreign language, but there didn't seem to be anything particularly special about these letters and symbols. More importantly, where had Twilight learned to do this, and why was she so obsessed with it? Luna didn't know what to make of it, but it seemed suspicious that so much had happened since yesterday, but how could she even begin to address her concerns?

Twilight cut her off, "Isn't it amazing? It's called a programming language. It's a new form of magic, in which one can specify what one wants to happen, and it does! All you have to do is be precise enough about what it is you want, and there are loops, and functions, and..." Twilight tackled the Princess and resumed talking to her while standing on top of her, "it is the greatest form of magic ever, don't you see? Why have I never known about this? Do you have any idea the possibilities this creates? You just don't get it do you? But I get it. I see everything. There is nothing beyond my knowledge, and there is nothing beyond my power, because knowledge is power, and with this as an existing part of the universe how can there ever be an excuse to not know or be able to do anything ever again, as this gets rid of all limitations, removes all boundaries..."

"Twilight Sparkle!" spat Luna in the royal Canterlot voice. She spoke so fiercely that she blew Twilight off her with the power of her voice. Luna no longer cared to think about where this knowledge came from. Luna's cheeks were again aflame as Twilight's excuse was far worse then she could have hoped, and even now that Luna was here she was being ignored. Twilight should feel guilty. Maybe it would help Twilight break free of this stupid obsession after all, right? She opened her mouth, to harass the nearby air with the harshness of her voice, but again found a sudden surge of sympathy for Twilight, as she remembered how much help she had been on Nightmare Night. She let out a sigh instead, and spoke in a more reasonable manner.

"Look, what you have discovered is interesting and all, but I expected better out of Celestia's star pupil. Had you really forgotten me so easily? I had been under the mistaken impression that you hated tardiness as much as I do. But what is done is done. So can we please just do something that friends would do? I would be more than happy to study this, 'language' with you later," Luna voiced sternly.

It took a few moments for these words to pierce Twilight's brain, particularly the word 'later.' This new form of magic was like discovering magic all over again, only better. How could she just be expected to not focus on that for a while, especially when she was the first pony in all of Equestria to discover it. She, Twilight Sparkle, had discovered something. She had actually contributed something to all of ponykind like she had always dreamed of, but she never actually thought it was possible. Was it not her duty to continue to discover, and see how deep the well goes? Could she really betray all the ponies to come, for the sake of one?

Luna was a fellow academic; surely there must have been a way to make her understand. Twilight stared back at Luna with her eyes wide open and replied, "You want me to spend a moment of my time not working on this language? Do you know the things I have been able to do? I have gotten the phrase 'Hello World!' to float in midair. Yet you would have me pause for even a moment, when I am making the largest discovery in the history of magic? History is being made here; don't you see that? The logic is so beautiful... so eloquent... I've never seen anything like it."

"Please Twilight, I have as much academic interest as you, and what you are saying sounds fascinating, but for once, I am trying to put down the books, and make a friend. Learning something completely new is a great experience, but it is something that I am best at doing when I am alone, and I do not wish to be alone at the moment. Right now knowing that someone who isn't family cares for me, would mean much more than trying to fulfill this insatiable curiosity that has plagued me all my life," pleaded Luna.

Twilight had meant to listen. She knew that whatever the Princess had to say, it couldn't possibly take that long, but a brilliant idea struck her only moments after Luna had begun talking. What if she stored previously calculated results in an array, and checked that array first for a value, before, recursively calling a function to compute that value. It was such a simple yet brilliant idea that could cause her programs to run much faster. She just had to try it.

"So that's a no?" said Twilight, who continued to stare at and revise the floating symbols, as she had been the entire time Luna had just been talking.

"Are you even listening to me?" demanded Princess Luna.

"A simple yes or no will do," muttered Twilight to the symbols she was staring intently at.

Luna stood in place shaking, trying to restrain herself. She wanted to shake Twilight, but, though tough love was in order, Luna reminded herself that nothing that drastic would do any good. On the other hoof, normal tough love wasn't working, so clearly Twilight needed something a little stronger. After three seconds pondering, she picked up Twilight and said, "I am doing this for your own good," while dragging her outside.

"This is a little something called fresh air!" yelled Luna as she simultaneously slammed Twilight's front door.

The thought, "Luna is evil," flashed through Twilight's mind, but she brushed this thought aside quickly. She had just finished modifying the code to include this revision but had not gotten a chance to see the difference when it ran. Why had she been forced away from discovery? She was on the verge of profound insight, when suddenly she had been dragged away. It was hard not to think that Luna didn't want her to learn. And that robot had given her all the information she needed to know for this great power on that disk, so clearly he couldn't be evil. If what he said was true, then Celestia had given her power as well, but at the same time, she had likely taken away knowledge of this far greater power, as even this seemed mildly familiar. Had she really let emotion cloud her reasoning? Could she take that chance? She had let herself accept something as completely removed from logic, as Pinkie sense. What did she really know about Celestia or Luna? A sharp but familiar pain surged through her head again.

She could scarcely think but she needed to make a decision. Celestia or the robot? Given power or removed power? Logic or emotion? Every second she wasted thinking about this, was another she could be making this discovery, if she choose to believe the robot. Further, the knife jamming deeper and deeper into her skull begged she choose something, and it did not care what. She made her choice, and her head cleared.

"It all makes sense now. You and your sister are just trying to keep me away from this powerful magic. It really is true," said Twilight coolly.

"What?" Luna snorted, "This meeting was planned before you became obsessed with this 'programming.'"

"Yes, but it was you who gave me the clue I needed to discover programming among other things, and it is why at that same meeting, you scheduled this one. You don't really want to be friends. You are here to spy on me, and make sure I don't become too powerful, by distracting me with friendship. I understand now. Technology like that robot is programmed, and programming does not lie. It is the perfect magic of beauty and truth," said Twilight.

Luna replied, "I am really concerned about you Twilight. I don't know what happened to you, since yesterday, but I sense darkness brewing in your heart. We should go see Celestia, because she can get you the help you need."

"I step out of line so you want to take me to see your sister, to tighten the leash. Well if you think I am going to tolerate that then you have another thing coming. You'll take me to see Celestia over my dead body," grunted Twilight.

"I am sorry Twilight, but this is for your own good," said Luna as she started charging toward Twilight.

At the last second Twilight teleported out of the way, but Luna teleported a few yards in front of her, almost immediately afterward, and knocked Twilight right off her hooves upon collision.

"You did something similar in our first battle, remember?" said Luna. "Did you really think I would fall for that again?" she continued.

Twilight began to lift Luna with her magic, but Luna used her own magic to put herself down, and countered by thrusting Twilight into the wall of a neighboring house, with her magic. "Do you really think your magic, is more powerful than that of the bringer of the moon?" asked Luna.

Twilight got up, and a huge cone around her horn began glowing, as if she were trying to lift that water tower again, only this time, grass, bricks, and even houses were becoming mysteriously desirable. Luna however has a stronger magic resistance than most, so she picked up on the want it need it spells before they affected her, and proceeded to shut her eyes. "Not a bad distraction attempt, but I have much more experience than you. I don't even need to be able to see, to move objects accurately with my magic."

As she was saying this Twilight was repeatedly being slammed into the ground, and then Luna stopped and dropped her.

"You don't have the elements of harmony or your friends helping you this time. It would just be easier for everyone, if you just came with me quietly. You must know that we have your best interests at heart," said Luna.

Twilight laughed so hard her whole body shook, with her neck sporadically twitching the whole time. "You really haven't heard a thing I've said all night have you? Did you think I was kidding when I said I had discovered a new form of magic? Did you not notice that I have been casting spells to distract you just enough for me to write a small program?" taunted Twilight.

Twilight tapped a bunch of floating symbols with her horn, and then a brick flew out of one of the houses at Luna.

"A single brick? Really?" puzzled Luna. Luna held it back with her magic quiet easily.

Then a second brick dislodged itself from the house and flung itself at Luna, and she held it back to. Luna then tried to throw them back, but they wouldn't budge.

"Did I forget to mention they are programmed to apply a force proportional to the force applied to them? Oh silly me," said Twilight.

"Well it's only two..." began Luna when a third brick flung itself at her, which she likewise began to hold back, and then she continued, "three."

However before long there were about a hundred bricks floating a few feet in front of Luna and they were all still trying to make their way toward her. Luna was sweating and panting, but she was still keeping the bricks in place.

"You see, this is the brilliance of programming. I don't even have to keep putting magic into it to keep these bricks coming at you. They won't stop until you are unconscious, so you may as well let it happen."

Luna hated to admit it but she couldn't think of any way out of this, though it was difficult to think at all with the amount of concentration that she was using to hold the bricks back. She had run out of sweat to sweat, and her eyes just felt so heavy, that a nice brick induced nap was beginning to sound good. She let go and all one hundred bricks hit her at once.

After several seconds a heavily panting Luna emerged from the pile of bricks. Scrapes and bruises covered her, and her eyes glowed with rage, but she teleported away.

Suddenly new symbols overlaid themselves on top of the old symbols that said, "OutOfBoundsException: Target Luna cannot be found within the bounds of BrickA103E2776G" and bricks ceased removing themselves from her neighbor's house. 

"If only she had let me read the section on exception handling, on this hard drive first, I would know what that means," sighed Twilight. "Oh well. No time like the present to find out," she said enthusiastically and she returned to her library with her pupils smaller than ever and her neck twitching.


	3. Chapter 3: Operation Boomshy

**And Then There Were Ponies Chapter 3: Operation Boomshy**

On the same night Twilight and Luna fought, in a quaint cottage on the edge of Ponyville where Fluttershy lived, was a meeting of ponies that had started at about 10:30pm and had gone on for a little over half an hour. Celestia had wanted somewhere they could meet privately, yet not somewhere that Unicorns and Earth ponies could not trod on without magic, such as Rainbow Dash's cloud house.

"Did Twilight look different in any way when she ran off?" Rarity reiterated the question she had just been asked. Rarity proceeded to answer said question, "She did have that crazy look in her eyes, but I'm sure it was nothing."

"You _thought_ it was nothing," corrected Princess Celestia. "Is that all anypony can remember about what happened in Everfree Forest?" inquired Celestia.

"Yes, it is!" said Rainbow Dash stomping a hoof into the ground, and glancing through all her friends, daring any of them to refute this. "Now why have you called us all here? Where is Twilight?" demanded Rainbow Dash. Rainbow Dash wasn't upset with Rarity, as Celestia had been pushing them for these kinds of answers. Rainbow Dash had been patient with the princess for thirty minutes, but there was nothing she hated more than talking about somepony who wasn't there to defend themselves.

"My little pony, please understand that I am exercising my royal duty as princess to find out what is wrong with Twilight, so that we may help her," said Celestia, putting a certain emphasis on the word princess, in hopes of reminding Rainbow Dash that she wasn't dealing with just anypony.

"No, I don't care if you are the princess. You can't just gather every pony except one, especially since all of our conversation has been about her. You claim it's about Everfree Forest, but it's always Twilight this and Twilight that. This just reeks of talking about some pony behind her back. I'm outta here," spat Dash.

"Please, Rainbow Dash, your loyalty is appreciated, but Twilight needs our help," begged Celestia.

Rainbow Dash had stopped mid-window to hear Celestia out, and then she turned around to respond. "Really? If this is all about helping Twilight then why wasn't she invited?" exclaimed Rainbow Dash.

"Try to understand. She is in a very fragile state at the moment. The humans have confused her with their cunning lies. We need to be very careful in how we approach her," stated Celestia.

"That's exactly what I'm talking about. Why does every pony keep talking about Twilight like she is some mental patient we have taken pity on? She is our friend, and not easily fooled," replied Dash who was still hovering in Fluttershy's window.

"As much as I hate to admit it, there is evidence that Twilight's mental state is fragile. She attacked my sister. She could have killed her," pleaded Celestia, who was visibly tearing up.

Rainbow Dash slowly left the window and lowered herself toward the ground. She then closed both eyes and shook one hoof in the air, and then opened them upon slamming all four hooves onto the ground. She darted out of the room through that same window.

Celestia called after her, "She's in room 2B."

"Will she be okay?" asked Fluttershy.

"Rainbow Dash or Luna? Regardless, the answer is yes. Luna is healing nicely. She needs rest, but she is expected to be out in a couple of days. As for Rainbow Dash, she just can't take my word for this sort of thing, and needs to see for herself. I don't blame her. It is very hard to take in," said Celestia.

"It just ain't like Twi. I don't agree with how Dash has been acting, but I do have to admit, I understand where she is coming from. Something stinks worse than cow manure, like we don't have the whole story," said Applejack.

"Er... Well the reason for that is," began Celestia who was starting to sweat bullets. Princess Celestia then heaved a great sigh. "I'll tell you the whole thing, but I think we should wait until Rainbow Dash gets back. She should hear this too."

"You have been keeping secrets from us about what happened to poor Twilight, and you expect us to wait?" whined an appalled Rarity.

Rainbow Dash then darted back into the room through the same window saying, "It amazes me how often you ponies seem to forget who you are dealing with. Did you really think I would be gone for that long? I made it to the hospital and back in ten seconds flat." Dash said looking at her friends. Her voice suddenly became much louder and piercing as she glared over toward Celestia and demanded, "Now start talking."

"The key reason Twilight is liable to have believed its lies is that it was crafted by humans, and, despite my best efforts, she is still in some ways more human than pony. They were able to appeal to her reason in a way we cannot," said Celestia.

"Does that mean Twilight is an alien and that a laser will beam down to take her home like this? ?" inquired Pinkie Pie holding two hoofs up and staring at the ceiling.

For a moment everypony stared at Pinkie Pie. Then Applejack spoke up, "More human than pony? Despite your best efforts?"

"It is what it sounds like. Twilight was once a human. I turned her into a very young filly, no more than a few days old. This transformation caused her to lose all of her memory, and significant portions of her knowledge, but some of it stayed," said Celestia.

"Phhhheeeeeewwwwfffffffftttttt," reiterated Pinkie Pie, who likewise repeated the gesture.

"This whole thing still stinks," barked Rainbow Dash. "Why would she trust their reasoning more, if everything you have told her is true?"

"Well..." muttered Celestia, "... about that... While I haven't lied to her per se, I have never told her about her true origins, and now that she is hearing them for the first time from another source, and knows that it is probably true... It does jeopardize my credibility a bit."

"Geez, no wonder she doesn't trust you! The more I listen to you, the more I find myself having the same problem! What else have you not told us, or her for that matter? Tell us everything now, or I swear soon none of you will be worried about Twilight, as you'll be having a meeting about poor, unstable Rainbow Dash!" said Rainbow Dash who was now flying just high enough to be eye level with the princess, and whose eyes were nearly pressed against hers.

"Ooh, does Rainbow Dash get to be an alien? Can I be one too? I've always wanted to get beamed up by a laser," beamed Pinkie Pie.

"Pinkie Pie! What did I tell you at the gala about ponies not always wanting to laugh?" fumed Rainbow Dash.

"I've been thinking about that, actually. But just because a pony doesn't want to laugh, does that mean a pony doesn't need to laugh?" said Pinkie Pie.

Rainbow Dash immediately countered with, "Yes... but... ponies want..." She then trailed off, realizing she couldn't think of any counter argument to this. Rainbow Dash's flaps became slower, until, after three seconds, she landed. She began to ponder this for a second while staring at the floor, when suddenly she was startled by a Pinkie Pie, up in her face barking at her.

Something about the way Pinkie Pie startled her, and the way this reminded her of Pinkie Pie's crazy animal antics at the gala, triggered something in Rainbow Dash's brain. "Darn it, Pinkie Pie," she managed to choke out between breaths, as she was now rolling on the floor laughing uncontrollably.

"I made a mistake, and I acknowledge that, but I promise I never kept this secret to harm anypony. I meant it for her own good. I have no other secrets, and I need you to trust me. I need you to restore her trust in me. As her mentor and a prominent figure in her life, her distrusting me is creating much greater problems, as can be seen by what she did to my sister. Please, be mad with me all you want, but we need to help Twilight. Would I be begging for your help if I did not care?" pleaded Celestia.

Rainbow Dash got up off the floor and couldn't help feeling much less angry then she did before and, as much as she hated to admit it, being angry at Celestia was counterproductive to helping Twilight. "Alright, what is your plan?" mumbled Rainbow Dash.

"I think right now gentleness is key. However, what she ultimately needs is a push in the right direction. For the time being, I think one friend at a time might be about what she can handle. I think we should send in Fluttershy first. The following day I think Applejack should try to talk a little bit of sense into her with her honest, but still gentle approach. Finally I think Rainbow Dash should go the third day, and point out that Twilight has crossed the line. Should this not quite do the job, I think Rarity should reaffirm what Rainbow Dash and Applejack said, and give the final nudge," said Celestia.

"What about me?" asked Pinkie Pie.

"You are the backup in case my plan completely falls apart. If all goes well, you won't need to do anything at all, but should she become increasingly suspicious of us, your ability to get her to laugh will become crucial," said Celestia.

"We should call it plan Flutterdash," said Pinkie Pie.

"Pinkie Pie is right. Every plan worth having needs an awesome name, to help inspire us to do our best. But nothing short of a legendary sonic rainboom has enough awesomeness. The plan should instead be called Operation Boomshy," said Rainbow Dash.

"Ooh how about we fuse our two names for the plan together. We could call it Operation Fluttershy..." interjected Pinkie Pie. There was a long pause after which she said, "Yeah okay I like Operation Boomshy better."

This seemed like an odd time to be worried about names to Applejack, but it sounded pretty good to her so she nodded.

Fluttershy thought the name sounded awfully violent, as if she was exploding, but everypony else seemed happy with it so naturally she shook her head as well.

Rarity could think of thousands of better names, but they all involved fashion, and she doubted she could convince any of the others they were better names. "Well it does have a certain pizzazz to it," Rarity conceded. "Now that that is official, and since Twilight isn't here to ask the good questions, I have to ask, how did a human get into Equestria?" asked Rarity.

"She was sent as part of an army meant to destroy us. However, they have had trouble getting technology to reliably transport them here, so only Twilight survived. Thankfully, I discovered her before she could harm anypony, and turned her into a filly. It was the only way not to destroy her, without being forced to imprison her forever, that I could think of. When I saw that she had become a normal pony I had hoped this day would never come, but I always knew I was wrong," answered Celestia.

"So her bein' your pupil..." began Applejack.

"…Was a bit of a setup. She is the most talented pony I have ever seen, magically speaking, but that was just a convenient excuse to keep an eye on her. She was a bit uncomfortable around other ponies, which I thought must be because of imperfections in my spell, but eventually she matured enough that I felt she could safely develop friends. I tried to subtly encourage her to do so, but it never really took until she met you five," interjected Celestia.

"I just don't know what to say... Regardless it would seem we are done here, and a good thing, too. Would you believe it is so late already? Well, a unicorn does need her beauty rest. See you at the spa tomorrow, Fluttershy, at our usual time. I'd love to hear all about how your meeting with Twilight goes," said Rarity before trotting off.

"Speakin' of the time, 'ah need to get an early start on those chores tomorrow. Since Big Macintosh is out of town, I have twice as much to do," said Applejack before leaving.

"Yeah, I guess now that we got this all figured out, no sense in me sticking around," said Rainbow Dash before darting off.

"There sure aren't very many ponies left here. Oooh! I know! I should organize a you-got-over-your-crazy party for Twilight. It won't be for a few days yet, but I want it to be the best party ever, so I better get started right way," said Pinkie before bouncing off.

Princess Celestia got up and was about to leave herself, when she noticed it looked as though Fluttershy wanted to say something.

"I just wanted to say that, well, uh..." began Fluttershy.

"You wanted to apologize on behalf of your friend for how Rainbow Dash treated me, right? Think nothing of it," said Celestia.

"Actually... no. I just wanted to say that... well... while I'm glad we are helping Twilight... and that you told us about what is going on... well... with the secrets and all... it's just that... you.. uh... well... Bad!" said Fluttershy attempting a yell at the end and pointing to Princess Celestia with a hoof.

Celestia was so taken aback by this that she just stood there staring at Fluttershy.

After a minute of Fluttershy staring back at her she pleaded, "Could you please leave now... if you don't mind. You can stay if you want, but I won't be happy about it. I might even frown at you."

Celestia slowly walked out the door with her head held low. On her way out she whispered in a voice not even Fluttershy could hear, "I'm really, really sorry." She wept silently the rest of the flight to the palace.

Twilight awoke holding a hoof to her head. She felt well rested. Everything about the previous day felt hazy. She had had this strange nightmare in which she attacked Luna. Or did that actually happen? What did she do yesterday? She laid in silence, with a hoof to her head, for several minutes trying to distinguish reality from dreams.

She then trotted over to her check list, and went through item after item, of morning ritual. She had repeated this process so many times, she didn't need a checklist anymore, but it comforted her to have one. Something about seeing all the checks on the page assured her that she had accomplished something. Throughout this process her thoughts muttered things like, "I attacked the princess," but she was not yet awake enough for this to sink in.

After she finished the last item on the list, she gasped, "I attacked Princess Luna?" Twilight began running all over her house, not sure what to do, but positive she should be doing something. "Celestia will be here any minute! She'll ban me from all of Equestria! What if she throws me in a dungeon in the place she banishes me to?" Twilight began to run around even more frantically, until eventually she was so distracted by her negative thoughts, she ran horn first into a bookshelf, and knocked down several books.

"I can't have the place a mess with Princess Celestia about to banish me! What if she decides that I am such a slob, she has me placed in a dungeon within a dungeon in the place she banishes me to!" gasped Twilight. She proceeded to put the books back in order. "Yes, of course. Cleaning! Maybe if the place is cleaner and more organized, she won't punish me as harshly," muttered Twilight, before proceeding to wipe everything with the wrong end of a feather duster.

Maybe some fresh air would liven up her place enough to put Celestia in a slightly less bad mood when she arrives. Twilight proceeded to open her front door, and on the other side of it, stood Fluttershy. Twilight proceeded to put her chin on Fluttershy's back, and proceeded to bawl. "I've really done it this time Fluttershy. Will you at least write to me when Celestia banishes me?"

"Ah, there, there. Of course I'll write to you..." began Fluttershy before remembering that Celestia had no intention of banishing Twilight. Fluttershy continued, "Actually, I've already heard from the princess, and she has no intention of banishing you."

"You've heard from the princess?" inquired Twilight.

"She is very worried about you," said Fluttershy.

"But, what is she going to do to me?" asked Twilight.

"Just have you relax with your friends like usual," said Fluttershy, who had tried to convince herself this wasn't a lie on the way over, but still felt bad for saying "like usual." She blushed a little when saying it, but not nearly so much as Applejack would have, and Twilight had enough on her mind that she didn't notice.

This eased Twilight's nerves enough for her to realize that she had never heard Fluttershy knock. "How long have you been standing there?" asked Twilight.

"About half an hour," said Fluttershy.

"You have been knocking for half an hour?" asked Twilight.

"Actually, I have only hit the door twice. I have mostly been considering knocking for half an hour," said Fluttershy.

"In which case, I'm sorry it took me so long," said Twilight meagerly.

"Actually, that didn't take as long as it usually does. I stood at this one door for three hours, before realizing I was at the wrong house," said Fluttershy.

Twilight smiled briefly before the moment of levity died, and the guilt that had been waiting in line behind worry, instantly seized her mind. She should have been banished. She should have been banished a hundred times over. This wasn't like the times where her worry had convinced her that she deserved something, such as when she was late with a friendship report. Even when she said to Princess Celestia back then that she knew she should be punished some part of her knew that it wasn't true, but now there was no such part. Instead of feeling relieved she felt cheated of a punishment by Celestia. No pony should be allowed to do the things she has done.

Twilight rested her head on Fluttershy's back and sobbed. She sobbed like she hadn't since she was a filly, and anyone who overheard might have thought a young colt or filly had gotten a scrape. She didn't even feel embarrassed. She had attacked the princess. Would Fluttershy even still want to be her friend? At least if anyone would, Fluttershy would.

"There, there. Let it all out," said Fluttershy softly.

Twilight didn't want Fluttershy, or anypony else, to know what she had done but her burning throat needed to know if Fluttershy could still accept her. "You don't understand, I did something really bad," said Twilight.

"Oh, Twilight, there is nothing you could do to ever break our friendship. No matter how dark the deed, a friend is someone who holds out hope that the pony they knew and loved is in there somewhere, desperate to break free," said Fluttershy.

Again Twilight's immense curiosity briefly overcame her more pressing concerns, so she swallowed back tears, removed her head from Fluttershy's back, and asked, "Wow, Fluttershy, that was almost poetic. Do you write poetry?"

Fluttershy blushed a little turned away and mumbled, "Well, I can't take care of animals all the time, and even a pony who doesn't say much has to express her feelings somehow."

"I attacked Princess Luna," said Twilight frowning intently at the floor. Suddenly Twilight felt a hoof lightly press against her back. Fluttershy put her head between Twilight's head and the floor, smiling faintly up at her. It wasn't the daunting "everything is going to be alright" smile Twilight had been prepared to bitterly reject, knowing what a cruel lie that was, but instead this smile seemed to say, "remember what I said earlier. I meant it." Twilight wrapped two hoofs around Fluttershy and Fluttershy returned her affection. Twilight continued to cry, but quietly this time, and the two embraced in silence for about two minutes.

"Fluttershy, I don't know what to say, other than 'Thank you'. I don't know how you can still look at me, but the fact that you still can means everything. That is, unless..." said Twilight. What if Fluttershy didn't believe her? Who was she kidding? Of course Fluttershy didn't believe her. Twilight could barely believe it happened herself. "You don't believe me," said Twilight more as a statement of fact, than a completion of the sentence she had started to say.

"It's hard to believe. I can't picture it. But I have been by to see Princess Luna actually and well... there are just some things you just have to accept," said Fluttershy.

Rarely had Twilight ever seen Fluttershy speak with such confidence, and sincerity. Fluttershy really had forgiven her. "Wait, how did you even know Luna was in the hospital?" asked Twilight.

Fluttershy briefly considered lying, forgetting she had already mentioned Celestia, but realized especially for statements like the previous one, she needed Twilight's trust. Celestia's plan probably wouldn't approve of what she was about to do, but helping Twilight was more important than Celestia's dumb plan. "Princess Celestia told us," said Fluttershy.

"So my other friends know too? How did they take the news?" asked Twilight.

"They just want what's best for you, like I do," said Fluttershy.

Twilight smiled weakly. Her friends were still her friends. Still, Twilight wondered if she could ever respect herself again. She had even said cruel things about her mentor last night. "I really appreciate the visit and the support but I need some time alone to think things over. However, I would like to ask you one last question before you go."

"Anything," said Fluttershy excitedly. She couldn't possibly miss an opportunity to help Twilight.

"What if I weren't a pony?" said Twilight.

"Celestia told us that too, and that doesn't bother us either. I'm sure the shock of learning that must have been immense. Last night really had a lot of exceptional circumstances," said Fluttershy before slowly walking out the door. It didn't feel right to leave Twilight alone, but she wasn't one to overstay her welcome.

Twilight appreciated what Fluttershy was trying to do with that last comment, but she also felt annoyed by it. It taunted her. If only the world were really that simple, where things being different then they usually were could justify such harmful actions. She was glad to learn from Fluttershy that her friends still cared about her, yet somehow she didn't feel any better. No doubt she would otherwise be feeling even worse right now, but Twilight couldn't bear to imagine how that was possible. No matter how many ponies forgave her, she still hospitalized somepony. The worst part was she didn't even feel guilty when doing it; she had felt excited and empowered. Who was she?

What had Fluttershy meant when she said, "Celestia told us that too"? No matter how Twilight analyzed it or tried to reason it to mean something else, that statement made one fact clear. Twilight wasn't a pony. Perhaps she was an evil human, and her true nature had emerged for the first time when fighting Luna. Perhaps she was something else entirely? Whatever she was, she was undoubtedly a disgrace to the universe.

But if she wasn't a pony, that meant the robot had been right. Celestia really hadn't been forthcoming with her. But the robot couldn't be completely right. Her friends still loved her despite what they knew... unless this was another of Celestia's tricks! Celestia's magic was so powerful, how did she know that was Fluttershy at all? Of course, how had she been so stupid! Not even Fluttershy could love her after what she had done. Heck, the Luna she "attacked," may not have been real at all, but a ploy to make her feel guilty to once again cause Twilight's emotions to overshadow her reason. She hated that stupid Fluttershy illusion and herself for desperately wanting it to come back, and tell her she was still loved.

Why was the darkness making such an awful noise? Slowly, a blurry image of her library began to come into focus and the sound filled the room again, only this time it sounded distinctly like knocking. Unlike the previous morning Twilight didn't feel well rested at all, and the events of the previous day immediately rushed back to her throbbing head. She didn't have the luxury of pretending it was all a dream anymore.

She slowly trotted over to the door, with a hoof on her forehead. She didn't know why she bothered putting a hoof there, as it didn't bring her any relief, but she didn't give it, or anything much thought, as she twisted the knob and pulled the door open. There stood Applejack, or at least somepony or something that appeared to be Applejack.

"Sorry. Did I come a might early? I've never seen ya sleep past noon before," said Applejack.

Twilight remembered learning in one of her many tomes on magic, that solid illusions were considerably harder to make and maintain, so Twilight proceeded to pat Applejack all over, and she felt solid. Twilight immediately felt foolish for doing so, as she just remembered, she had rested her head on Fluttershy's back yesterday, and hugged her. Could Celestia even make illusions that were this real? Twilight's head began to throb more rapidly.

"Uh, yes... er, howdy to you too... That was an interesting greetin'," said Applejack, who felt the need to break what had to her been an awkward silence.

Twilight knew she was getting her hopes up, but what if an Applejack that still cared about her really were sitting in her kitchen right now. Could it really do her that much harm to at least pretend what she wanted the most, was true? "I'm sorry, Applejack, I'm just so confused," blurted out Twilight. She hadn't meant to say that, but she wasn't sure what she had meant to say.

"It was downright unlike her for Celestia to keep secrets from you like that, but that's just it, sugar cube. Though what she did is wrong, it is unlike her," said Applejack.

The words "unlike her" resonated with Twilight, reminding her how she had gone against her own nature in attacking Luna. "Just like attacking somepony who was just trying to help is unlike me?" spat Twilight.

Applejack started to her open her mouth but quickly closed it. She had never seen Twilight go from desperate to mean so quickly. Honestly, she couldn't think of another time she had seen Twilight be mean.

Twilight returned to her usual tone and asked, "What did Celestia say exactly, anyway?"

Applejack, thinking that Twilight already knew and was just stirring up trouble, like with her last remark, said, "That's not important. You being different doesn't amount to nuthin'. You're still plenty pony to us."

"What did she say?" demanded Twilight stomping one of her front hooves.

Applejack began sweating as she just wanted to help her friend, and she seemed to be messing everything up. Also, she couldn't even begin to remember Celestia's exact wording, "Uh, well, uh..." mumbled Applejack, "she said you were a human. But uh... as I said you're still plenty pony to us."

"Why is that?" demanded Twilight, "Because you can't bear the thought of having a friend who isn't a pony? You have to pretend so everything can be right with the world!"

If only she weren't so dumb, and could use some of those fancy words Twilight would use, maybe she could help her understand. Normally, wording just seemed like a stupid little thing, especially with so much work to do, but now what she wouldn't kill to have at least peeked at a dictionary last night.

Applejack got on her knees and begged, "Please, Twilight... I just don't know what to say. I know ah can be dumb sometimes, but that never stopped you from likin' me before. Please, I just want you to hang out with us, like we use to. We don't care about any of these stupid things that are trying to get in the way of our friendship. Just tell me what to say, and ah'll say it."

Twilight had never seen Applejack so desperate. Had Twilight really become so irrational, that her friends couldn't talk to her like a reasonable pony? "I'm sorry, Applejack. I really am just very confused," reiterated Twilight putting a hoof back on her forehead. "I want the same thing you do, but I just don't know if that's possible. I have done the unforgivable. I'm not even a pony. Can you honestly say that doesn't bother you?" said Twilight.

Applejack liked this question, as she knew the answer to it. "Yes" she said confidently.

"But..." refuted Twilight.

"No, Twi. Friendship is more powerful than all that. We've already seen twice what friendship can do," said Applejack.

"I attacked Luna," said Twilight.

"Friendship is more powerful than even that," said Applejack.

Many fond memories rushed to her head, upon being reminded of the power of friendship. She saw Applejack, telling her to let go, and her trust being well placed. She saw Fluttershy standing up to a dragon, because it had hurt her friends. She saw Rarity agreeing to repeatedly remake their dresses. She saw Rainbow Dash performing a sonic rainboom to catch Rarity. She saw Pinkie Pie ridding Ponyville of parasprites with her music. Most of all, she felt that surge of energy that hit her when she realized how glad she was to have these friends, and when she later realized she could reclaim her friends from Discord's grip.

"Why do I keep letting myself doubt you guys?" asked Twilight who hugged Applejack. Twilight felt strangely happy for a change, as she let go of Applejack. "Did you say that it's past noon already, on such a beautiful day? What a waste. Come on, Applejack, let's enjoy the sunshine!" said Twilight, who proceeded to clap her hooves together rapidly, and then bounce around the room.

Applejack had never seen Twilight so strangely giddy. She didn't have a clue how she did it, but somehow she had done it, and it only took two ponies. "I'd love to stay, Twilight, but sadly I had just enough time to talk for a minute. Big Macintosh isn't arrivin' back till tomorrow so I still have loads to do."

Twilight just now noticed that Applejack had bags under her eyes. "Not this again," said Twilight in a voice that was way more excited than made sense for the sentiment she was trying to express.

"Don't worry none, sugar cube. It's only for a total of two days this time, and I have no intention of forcing work on some pony who just got well again," said Applejack.

"If you insist," said Twilight who proceeded to bounce off into the sunlight.

Twilight awoke several times during the previous night, until eventually, while it was still dark out, she decided to give up on sleep. Her eyes felt heavy, but at least her head didn't hurt... much. This headache was never consistent enough for Twilight to get used to, but just came and went as it pleased. She couldn't believe she had ever felt gleeful and carefree, especially not as recently as yesterday. Of all the places for her random walk to have taken her, why did it have to take her to the hospital, and why did she think visiting princess Luna would be a good idea? Luna didn't yell at her, or say anything about their fight, but something about seeing her in the hospital made the reality of what she did sink in all over again, despite Luna leaving that very same day. Twilight didn't say anything and didn't stay long. She couldn't.

And now it was as if Applejack had never come. No, thought Twilight, that wasn't true. At least now she trusted her friends and Celestia again. She couldn't believe that in her desperation, to deny what she did, she let herself think poorly of them again. She was truly pathetic. She was not used to guilt, especially not this much, but that was no excuse. What other pony became so bipolar when feeling guilty...? Heck, even Rarity, would have dealt with the situation better than this.

But despite her best efforts to rationalize that her feelings were stupid, they remained, so she continued struggling with her thoughts all throughout her morning checklist. As she was finishing, her thoughts were just starting to fall upon why Celestia hadn't told her who she really was. She believed Celestia's motives were good, but it still bothered her. Though she hadn't thought much on it the past couple of days, she couldn't help but wonder what was up with programming. What a strange form of magic. What did it mean about their world, and her place in it? Did it somehow pollute her mind?

But these thoughts were cut off by the door swinging open and Spike walking in.

"When did you leave?" asked Twilight.

"I left two days ago. Are you telling me you didn't notice? I told you while you were playing with your stupid floating text, that I was going to Dragon Con," said Spike.

"Oh..." said Twilight, who blushed a little.

"Anyway, it is good to be back, but I have a lot of sleep to catch up on. Oh sleep, you're such a good friend. Why have I neglected you?" said Spike curling up into his little bed.

The more she thought about it, the more the idea of this new form of magic polluting her mind didn't make sense. The humans' magic should be more logical than their own, and even theirs couldn't do that. The idea of power that could consume somepony the more it is used was just a ponytale. Her actions could not be excused that easily, and she grew tired of clinging to excuses that fell apart under scrutiny.

She had done something terrible, but pondering it wasn't making anything any better, and in regard to this new magic, there was so much to discover. It seemed almost as though she shouldn't return to coding, just on principle of it being part of what triggered her fight with Luna. Furthermore, it was what she ultimately used to injure her. However, Twilight quickly spotted this as the sort of emotional reasoning she was trying to avoid. Her own foolishness should not stand in the way of discovery for all ponykind.

As she scanned the file system on the drive, she remembered that it was only by chance that the first ones she looked at were programming tutorials. There were a number of other files on there she hadn't looked at yet. Could there be still more forms of magic? Or perhaps just information that would contain a contradiction, which she could use to discredit that stupid robot even further? Though if she weren't herself she probably would have advised herself against it, she decided to open another random folder and look at its contents.

There was but a single file in the folder, which contained code, not unlike the code she had been writing, but much longer, and there were many functions that she didn't recognize. She tried to read the code, and while she made progress, it took her half an hour just to understand a single small function. Even then, she didn't know why it did what it did, as she didn't know this function's role in the larger scheme of things. This new form of magic was far more vast then she could have imagined. Sadly, her current understanding would make it take too long to understand this code. Of course, she could always run it and see what happens.

No! She instantly recognized that as a bad idea. Despite her overwhelming curiosity, her cautious nature made the risks impossible to ignore. If she at least had a grasp for the depths of what this magic was capable of, maybe she could justify it, but she had yet to see its limitations. For all she knew this script could cause all of Equestria to explode. Then again, if it were so easy to destroy all of Equestria by themselves with this magic, why even bother sending the massive invasion force they did. Who knows, maybe this file was on there by mistake. She couldn't think of a much more reasonable explanation for the programming tutorials being on there after all.

Still, she couldn't take the chance. The only reasonable thing to do was to come back to the code when she had learned more, and then try to read it again. She proceeded to look at the contents of other random folders, only to find that most of them contained gibberish. She only bothered to look at a few such files, before returning to reading up on how to program, and trying out what she learned. It hardly seemed like any time at all, before the sun was not only up, but it was three thirty.

"Hey, isn't that that thing, that that weird thing gave you?" inquired a familiar voice.

Twilight looked around to see that behind her was Rainbow Dash, who was beating her wings just often enough to stay in the air. Twilight didn't want to stop what she was doing, as her program wasn't working, and with just a few more minutes she felt sure she could catch the error, but she didn't want to make the same mistake as last time. Furthermore, she was glad to see Rainbow Dash. Though she had heard from Fluttershy that everyone still cared about her, it was refreshing to see each of her friends affirm this one by one. "Yes, it is. That arrow on the floating image is called a cursor, and if I use my unicorn magic on it, as if it were a real object, it moves," said Twilight before turning to face Rainbow Dash.

She had almost blurted out, "Here, you try it," but she caught herself.

"A floating picture that changes... That is pretty cool, I guess... Not as cool as my new trick, but if you'd rather stay cramped up in here staring at your little picture, I can do that too," said Dash.

"I didn't hear you knock," said Twilight.

"Sorry... I wanted to see you, and I forgot," said Rainbow Dash.

"You forgot to use a door?" puzzled Twilight.

"Look, you know what happened the other day, and I know what happened the other day, so let's not pretend it didn't happen. Can you blame me for being anxious to see you? I would have been here much sooner, but it was too early, so I decided to pass time by inventing a new trick and, well, I got a little caught up," said Rainbow Dash.

"What is with one pony coming to see me one at a time, day after day, anyway?" asked Twilight.

"Celestia's idea. She was talking about you like you were some sort of crazy pony. I thought about just going against her stupid plan, but I can be a bit difficult at times..." started Dash. She proceeded to land and look Twilight straight in the eye before continuing, "And I thought maybe you'd be better off with Fluttershy and Applejack for a bit. If I were any pony other than me, I would have come. Actually, on the night Celestia had her meeting, I came here afterward, but I ended up just going home instead of knocking."

"It's not like you to be hesitant," said Twilight hugging Rainbow Dash.

Rainbow Dash briefly considered hi-fiving her, but awkwardly hugged back. "It's not like you to attack Luna, but we all have off days," said Rainbow Dash. They laughed. After regaining their composure Dash blurted out, "Why did you anyway?"

"I... I..." stuttered Twilight. How could she possibly explain that she had doubted all of them? She even let herself believe her friends would abandon her if they knew the truth. It seemed so stupid now.

"Wait, no! Don't answer that!" interrupted Dash.

Rainbow Dash deserved an answer. Twilight had behaved irrationally yet her friends stood by her anyway. "I... was upset and confused, because I thought Celestia was taking advantage of my blind devotion, and that my friends wouldn't want me anymore. Our friendship has always felt too good to be true, and I guess that's why I've been paranoid about losing it, like when I thought I'd be banished to magic kindergarten. I've never really had friends before, and all of this has been like some sort of dream," said Twilight

"I get that."

"What?"

"I didn't have many friends growing up either. I guess they were intimidated by my awesomeness. When I was a filly, my confidence was me trying not to look weak. But after a couple years, I found I wasn't just pretending anymore."

"Wow, I never would have guessed."

"Why do you think I stood up for Fluttershy? I admired her for being able to be herself. I couldn't just let a couple of bullies try to ruin that. Somehow in standing up for her, I learned how to be myself too."

"When we were climbing that mountain, in order to relocate a dragon, you seemed irritated with Fluttershy."

"Hey, I never said I was patient."

It was silent for a while before Rainbow Dash spoke up again, "This has been a nice chat but we are still avoiding the real issue. Talking to Fluttershy and Applejack, it sounds like you have had some real highs and lows. I don't expect you to be completely over it in a few days, but you can give yourself stability. Are you better yet?"

"Of course not! How can I be?"

"I'm not gonna lie, facing your troubles head on isn't easy, but it is the only way to deal with them. Being asked not to join the Wonderbolts was hard, and it still hurts, but I'm cool with it."

"I hardly think the situations are similar."

"Doesn't matter. The approach is the same."

"We were having a good time. Why won't you leave this alone?"

"Because I know you. You aren't like me. You won't deal with this on your own."

"When have I faced anything like this before, in order for you to have gathered that information?"

"Just now. Why else would you be playing with that stupid picture, when you yourself admit that you're not cool with what has happened."

"Not everything is so simple, that one can just become 'cool with it.'"

"So avoiding the issue instead of resolving it is okay?"

"Look, I hate myself for what I've done and I always will."

"And you think that is acceptable."

"No."

"Then change it."

"I can't."

"Do it anyway."

"Have you really never encountered something you can't do?"

"Have you?"

"This is different."

"Only because you insist that it is."

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because I'm your friend."

"This isn't what friendship is about."

"Remember when you tied me down with several ropes and cast a memory spell on me? I hated it at the time, but I was grateful for it later. Didn't you learn sometimes that you have to fight for your friends? I'm just repaying the favor."

Twilight knew that this childish bickering could only end in a childish argument, and she didn't want to ruin Rainbow Dash's visit, so instead she returned to her program. Maybe she could find out what that error was.

If there was one thing Rainbow Dash hated, it was being ignored. Her eye was starting to twitch and she wanted to yell. "This was for Twilight," she repeated a few times in her head before breathing out an inaudible sigh. Rainbow Dash said, "Fine. Pretend to ignore me if you want, but you know that I'm right. Yeah, attacking the princess is unlike you, but we both know nothing like it will ever happen again, and she is okay. Remorse is stupid. If you dislike what happened, promise yourself it'll never happen again."

Twilight was so busy pretending she wasn't hearing every word Rainbow Dash was saying, that she didn't even realize she had opened the wrong folder, and run the wrong file.

Rapidly, everything became increasingly grainy-looking until it all looked like sand and blew away, leaving only Dash and Twilight. The new sand blew in, and formed a new image around them, that proceeded to become decreasingly grainy in appearance, until everything looked solid. They appeared to be in a hallway with various ugly creatures who looked very similar and were going to and fro. The creatures stood on two legs, had two arms, were taller than the ponies, and varied in skin tone from dark to light, but certainly none of them had the range of hues the ponies were used to.

Rainbow Dash and Twilight didn't know where they were, but one thing was for sure, they definitely weren't in Equestria anymore.


	4. Chapter 4: The Old Earth

**And Then There Were Ponies Chapter 4: The Old Earth**

Twilight realized almost instantly that the ugly creatures were human, but not because of her amazing powers of deduction. She recognized them. She didn't remember humans being ugly, but she remembered them looking as these beings did, and they seemed ugly to her now. She wondered if Rainbow Dash knew what they were. It would have been the most logical conclusion for her to draw, but then again, she probably didn't even notice that Twilight had run some program.

This line of thought was interrupted by the sharp pains of her breathing. Each breath felt as if she had been breathing heavily in cold air, except that this pain felt hot. Each was worse than the last. She felt as if, somehow, Rainbow Dash had landed on her back, as it was difficult to stand, but when she looked there was nothing weighing her down. However, she didn't contemplate this for long, as the humans were likely a threat.

The moment she thought that, one of the furthest away humans removed all doubt by shouting, "Whoever secures a pony will have their salary doubled!"

The humans, of which there were about ten in the hallway, began scrambling; some of them tripping on each other, and all were making their way towards the ponies. Dash had already head butted one in the stomach, knocking him down, but Twilight felt the need to explain to Dash anyway.

"Those are humans! Who knows what they intend to do to us?" said Twilight while attempting to run, but only going as fast as a rather slow walk.

"Doesn't matter. Things chasing you means you should attack them," said Dash.

Dash was a good athlete on the ground, but they wouldn't stand a chance once she got airborne. Or so she thought, anyways. Even with both wings flapping rapidly, she barely managed to get a foot off the ground.

"Come on wings! What gives!" cried Dash.

"It seems the gravity is higher here," said Twilight immediately unsure of why she said it.

Two humans grabbed Twilight and began to drag her down the hallway, but Twilight threw them into a wall with her magic. She hadn't meant to throw them as hard as she had, but hands pulling at her skin made it difficult to not react instinctively. Furthermore, she hadn't noticed that her instinctive throw had barely been hard enough, as she was quickly distracted by Dash's predicament.

Rainbow Dash finally managed to get several feet off the ground, and her head nearly touched the ceiling. However, hands pulled at each of her legs. Twilight tried to fling them with her magic, but with the gravity as high as it was, neither of them moved more than a few inches. Two more grabbed her tail and then the four of them slammed her into the ground. The scientists immediately dog-piled her. This time, Twilight kept applying more force until she saw them fly off of her, but they were so heavy, her horn developed a huge aura around it before that happened, and already three people were dragging her away from behind. There was one pulling at each of her legs and one at her tail.

Worse still, Rainbow Dash was lying on the ground covered in bruises and unconscious. Twilight now had their undivided attention. Their numbers seemed to have more than doubled, as she wasn't as willing to hurt them as Dash seemed to be, so they didn't stay down as long. She kept flinging them away from her, but could only focus on three at a time, and they just kept coming back. Soon there were arms grabbing at all different parts of her. She felt like she was going to be pulled apart, and there was no way she could concentrate enough to use magic. They were dragging her away.

"No! She is a pony! I won't let you change her back!" screamed Rainbow Dash.

Despite many bruises, Dash was airborne. She proceeded to ram the glob of humans that had formed around Twilight, causing them all to fly through the air in various directions. She swooped down and picked up Twilight, but couldn't manage to take off again. Already, three people were starting to pick themselves up.

With the brief moment of everyone picking themselves up, Twilight really saw the hallway for the first time. Suddenly the notion that she used to walk through this very hallway overwhelmed her. She didn't want to feel it, but some part of her knew this was home. She couldn't point to any specific memories, nor did she remember anything else about the building or world they were in. It was just a vague sense of being where she belonged, despite all the chaos going on around her.

"You can continue using that horn of yours anytime now," said Dash amid knocking one of the several human headed their way down.

Twilight immediately began throwing several people at a time away from them with her horn, but she began to sweat, as her horn was tired. With this gravity and these peoples' resilience she didn't have much more in her. Twilight panicked as she saw several more people entering the hallway.

She said, "We can't fight them forever, and more people are entering this hallway. I can't remember anything about where this building's exits are. What are we going to do?"

Rainbow Dash walked over to the nearest window, and beat the glass rapidly with her hoof, until it broke. She then said, "Then we'll make an exit."

"But you can't fly here while holding me," said Twilight.

"Then it's time I show you how meaningless _can't_ is," said Dash.

"I don't know..." started Twilight.

"You got any better ideas?" interrupted Dash.

People were pursuing her, so Twilight ran to the window and now the people were crowding around them. Upon being so close to Rainbow Dash, Twilight was amazed that, despite her sweat and bruises, she was still moving. As a result, she wasn't surprised that her head butts weren't even knocking them back anymore. Twilight desperately tried to toss them all with her magic, but a few sparks emitted from her horn and nothing more. There was no other escape.

Dash picked up Twilight and jumped out the window. Dash began pouring sweat, and her face was all scrunched up, as her wings accelerated to beating the air at humming bird speeds. This barely managed to keep them in the air, but it did. Twilight considered hi-fiving Dash, but thought better of it, as that seemed like it would be a difficult thing to do while flying.

This brief rejoicing quickly died upon feeling a warm sensation from below and looking down to see its cause. Below them was a pool of lava that stretched further than their amazing bird-eye view could see in all directions. They were a good hundred or so feet above it, but just a twenty foot descent would likely mean starting to melt or catch fire.

"I just remembered I used to teleport into that building, and we needed security to be extremely tight so we put it in a place surrounded by lava for numerous miles. We should go back," said Twilight.

"No! I won't lose you because I'm not a good enough flier!" insisted Dash.

Dash picked a direction and soared quickly in that direction. Her wings ached, but that was nothing new to her. "No pain, no gain," chanted Dash under her breath, as she flew straight ahead, at a speed that may well have created a sonic rainboom, if she had the help of gravity.

Twilight kept instinctively jumping, as her nervous system was absolutely convinced that she was far closer to a heat source than she should be. She could not begin to imagine how much worse it must have felt for Dash. Twilight could feel herself slipping on Dash's increasingly slippery skin due to an ever thickening layer of sweat. After a few minutes, Twilight feared she'd slip right off, and so, gripped even tighter, despite the added discomfort for Dash. However, Dash didn't show the slightest bit of hesitation or discomfort.

Twilight looked into Dash's eyes and saw furrowed brows that seemed to go beyond determination and almost looked angry. Twilight was amazed that somehow, despite the illogic of her words about doing things she can't do, she was doing them. However, Twilight could practically see the new bruises forming as Dash's wings rapidly beat the ever-resilient air, and was forced to conclude that despite the look in her eyes, it wouldn't be much longer yet. Ten minutes from when they had first jumped out of the window, there was still no end in sight, and Dash's wings stopped obeying her.

"No! No! NO!" shouted Dash as they both began falling, a hint of a tear in each eye. Then mid sentence all trace of sappiness instantly died as she recognized the purple aura around them.

"Dash, you've inspired me. If you can fly that far despite the circumstances, then my horn can take us the rest of the way," said Twilight, who proceeded to push them forward with her magic. Twilight couldn't imagine how Dash had flown so far, as after just a few seconds, Twilight could feel her horn throbbing to the point that she wondered if it was actually possible for horns to break. With each passing second, closing her eyes and letting the lava just end it all sounded more like a nice luxury.

But her friend had shown such determination to save her. Twilight wasn't nearly as sweaty or bruised, nor had she been doing this for nearly as long, yet from the moment she started she felt like giving up. She was a terrible friend. She had to make it up to Rainbow Dash somehow. She had to get them the rest of the way there.

However, after a few more minutes, her horn didn't emit any sparks, but instantly stopped. They could finally see land, but it must have been at least five miles away, and they were plummeting. Dash tried flapping her wings, but they were still aching and refused to move much. She couldn't even slow her own descent.

Twilight closed her eyes. She breathed out and let out her anxiety about falling, and her aching horn with that breath. Breathing out brought with it the sensation of spitting out tacks, but she didn't let that steal her attention for long. With each breath she let out numerous thoughts about her and Dash's impending doom and concerns about how to escape this place, until after a few breaths her mind was blank, and she filled it with thoughts of "Me and her over there. Me and her over there." Twilight had never teleported so great a distance, or two objects at once before, but that was a concern she let out on the first breath. Twilight felt a hot stinging sensation on her back. She was surprised that her skin didn't seem to be melting, or that she survived long enough to touch lava. This was the end.

"Are you okay?" asked Dash.

Twilight opened her eyes to discover that the teleportation had worked. The hot sensation was just the warm earth. She got up on her hooves.

"What do you suppose is with the air here?" asked Dash.

"I don't know. I don't remember much from... then..." said Twilight disdainfully before continuing, "But I do remember it not hurting when I breathe. More importantly which way do we go?"

"Unless you have any flashbacks, we'll just have to pick a way and move. How did we get here anyway?" said Dash while running forward, and looking back at Twilight.

"I accidentally ran a program that did that," blushed Twilight, who was so afraid of what Dash might think, she didn't notice Dash was already running ahead.

"We won't make it if we just stand around all day," said Dash.

But then Twilight realized what she had just said. "Ran a program to do that..." mumbled Twilight under her breath, before continuing in a far louder more excited voice, "Yes of course!" She began trying to cast the new spell she had learned, to get the floating screen to appear, but it kept failing.

Dash ran back to her asking, "What are you doing?"

"That 'pretty picture' is about to save our lives. You see, a program doesn't require much magic at all, and it has great power," said Twilight, who was repeatedly trying to get the faintest spark from her horn, until after a couple of minutes the screen came up. First a script to find and collect all nearby water thought Twilight, who proceeded to write statement after statement until, after about twenty minutes, the code was complete. She proceeded to run it with another spark from her horn, but the floating screen immediately filled with the words, "Task killed by an external process." No water had been collected.

"What happened?" asked Dash.

"It didn't work for some reason. Maybe I coded something wrong," said Twilight, frantically changing her code around to an alternate solution to the same problem, in hopes that using a different solution would somehow fix the mysterious error. However after running it again, the same mysterious message appeared. "There has got to be a way to fix this," groaned Twilight

"Twilight, we are going to have to find water, before we die," said Dash.

"But if I can just get this to work..." objected Twilight.

"You are still new to this, and we can't wait on you to learn," said Dash.

Twilight felt they were so close to safety with programming, yet she knew Dash was right. She didn't see anything about that message in the tutorials, and who knew how long it would take to figure out what the issue was. Everything in her wanted to continue and figure out what was going on, but she couldn't do that to Dash. "You are right," sighed Twilight. Twilight proceeded to attempt to run after Dash but her body seemed so heavy, she could barely manage the pace of a walk.

"Come on, we don't have time for this," said Dash.

"I can't."

"Have you learned nothing?"

"You didn't manage to get us here alone."

"Who said 'I can't' means I have to do it without help? We jumped out of that window and we survived even though we couldn't. Now you are going to run even though you can't."

Twilight's hooves ached, but the more they ached, the more energy she put into them. Before long, Twilight caught up to Rainbow Dash, and the two proceeded to run. After a minute, the red earth gave way to a seemingly-endless stretch of sand. Twilight's hooves ached, and the bottoms of them were starting to go numb from the heat. Her body demanded heavy breathing, yet this turned the nuisance of breathing into a deep burning sensation that made her cough, which only made things worse. After five minutes, her hoofs couldn't support her anymore, and she collapsed to the ground.

"How does anybody live on this planet?" demanded Twilight.

"Soon we won't be either if we..." began Dash, who suddenly felt as though someone had just run by her holding a knife out just far enough to graze her skin as they went. Twilight likewise noticed a long cut appeared along her side, but neither of them saw anyone or anything go by.

"What happened?" asked Twilight.

"I don't know. It felt like the wind itself cut me," said Rainbow Dash.

Twilight and Rainbow Dash then noticed a small area in which the wind was going in a circle extremely rapidly. Suddenly, all that wind, as if being released from a sling, darted straight for Twilight. Dash knocked Twilight out of the way before it hit the middle of her forehead. This wind grazed Rainbow Dash, creating a similar cut on her other side.

Without another word Rainbow Dash and Twilight took off running. Suddenly, these razor winds started forming everywhere and Rainbow Dash, having much faster reflexes, had to keep telling Twilight which way one was coming from. After fifteen minutes, it finally stopped, and so did the ponies, who were now covered in cuts and dripping blood.

Twilight collapsed to the ground so hard that sand went up her nose, but she didn't care. The sand that went up her nose didn't feel any worse than the air that was constantly going in and out. Rainbow Dash was saying something that was likely another inspiring comment about doing things you can't do, but her voice felt so distant and muffled that Twilight was barely aware anything was being said. Her heavy eyelids fell, and everything was dark.

After what felt like a few seconds, the darkness began to give way to an image. Everything was blurry and sideways. Twilight was vaguely aware that she was moving, despite the fact that her hooves clearly weren't taking her anywhere. Twilight closed her eyes again, but a sudden jerk from below and Rainbow's voice crying out "Stupid rock!" caused her to tear her heavy eyes open. She looked down to see blue skin, and wings. "How long have you been carrying me?" said Twilight.

"About an hour. Do you think you can walk?" asked Dash.

Twilight didn't know what to say. She never realized just how far her friends were willing to go for her. She was grateful to the point of nearly being unsettled as she wasn't sure she was willing to go as far for Rainbow Dash. "Dash... I... I... Thank you!" said Twilight.

"You can start showing your gratitude by getting off my back," said Rainbow Dash looking back at Twilight with a smile.

"How can you smile at a time like this?" asked Twilight, who tried to gracefully dismount, but instantly remembered how much her muscles ached when she tried, and instead plopped to the ground. At least the sand she landed on was soft.

"I was scared, and I felt so alone with you unconscious. I began to wonder what was the point, but then I saw Pinkie Pie. She was singing that song about 'giggle at the ghosty.' My fear really did disappear, and I've had a hard time not smiling ever since. I know it doesn't make any sense, but friendship doesn't always have to," said Rainbow Dash.

Twilight tried to get up, but couldn't. She tried again, but again her legs fell out from under her greater than usual weight. She kept trying, as she couldn't possibly ask Dash for any more help, but kept failing each time.

"Need some help?" said Dash laughing lightly. She proceeded to lift Twilight, but then she too fell, and she couldn't get up. "Come on Twilight, we'll crawl there," said Dash. The ponies pushed down on sand with their front hooves, then pulled themselves forward, and repeated.

"Dash, if we don't get out of this alive, I just want to say, I'm sorry I didn't listen to you," panted Twilight between gasps of breath.

"You mean like you're not listening to me now that we will get out of this alive?" asked Dash.

Twilight had no idea how Dash could be so optimistic. They had no food or water, and were dehydrated, bleeding, and exhausted. Further, they could easily suffer from heat stroke since they appeared to be in a desert. To make matters worse, Twilight couldn't help but wonder if the air wasn't killing them somehow, and who knows when the crazy sharp wind would come back. She considered mentioning all this to Dash, but thought better of dashing her hopes. Instead, Twilight envied Dash a bit, as she wanted some of that optimism.

Dash stopped. She kept reaching out her hoofs but kept pulling them back to her, instead of her too them. Twilight thought at first she was messing around, but then she blurted out, "Come on, Twilight, we'll be there soon."

Twilight, who was now ahead of her, puzzled over this statement before saying, "Dash, are you okay?"

"Yeah, but I'd be better if you'd catch up. Come on, you can do it," said Dash, who continued to fruitlessly pull sand towards her, and who had a completely dazed look in her eyes.

Twilight examined the sand and noticed nothing special about it, positive there must be something different about it to keep Ponyville's greatest athlete at bay, but there was nothing. Dash had lost all her strength. Twilight then shook a hoof rapidly up and down in front of Dash's line of sight and said, "Dash! Dash!"

"Don't worry, I'm coming back for you Twilight," said Dash, her gaze never once acknowledging Twilight's hoof. Rainbow Dash then pulled sand toward herself weakly with a single hoof.

Twilight tried to drag Dash along with her, but she could not get her to budge. Twilight began pulling herself forward without Dash, promising herself that she would send Dash help, as soon as she could.

"I'm coming for you, Twilight," said Dash weakly, with her hoof not even moving anymore.

The sound of Dash desperately trying to help her stopped Twilight in her tracks. She wanted to keep going forward because she knew it was the only way they might survive, but she couldn't. She lay there for a few moments before finally crawling back to Dash.

"I'm sorry Dash, that I couldn't be as strong as you. Maybe if I were, we could have gotten out of this alive," said Twilight as she laid by Dash, to die with her friend. She wished Rainbow Dash was with it enough to spend these last moments with her, but she soon recognized that as a selfish wish. At least this way, Dash would never have to know the inevitable death that was coming upon them. Twilight once more closed her eyes, this time with no intention of ever opening them again.

Suddenly Twilight burst into consciousness. Where am I? She couldn't recognize where she was, and memory of recent events hadn't returned to her yet. She looked over and saw Rainbow Dash, with a wet wash cloth on her head, still muttering nonsense. How had they survived? Twilight began looking around and noticed they were in a cave. She continued looking around the cave for answers, when suddenly she noticed a very ugly person; at least, she thought it was a person.

He wasn't just ugly in the same sense that the rest of the humans were; he stood out as someone who was clearly ugly even by their standards. His right cheek was swollen to at least twice its normal size and had several scars on it. A little to the left of the center of his forehead, he had a huge burn so bad that the skin looked charred. He had a thin layer of white hair on his head, and his arms looked like they had repeatedly had skin grafts. He was very skinny and about five feet six inches tall, but he had clearly been taller once, seeing as how his back had a fairly considerable hunch.

The man was just sitting on a chair when he glanced over at Twilight and spat, "I don't suppose either of you know Antarin."

Twilight immediately remembered that was the name of that human language she knew. She responded, "Yes, will my friend be okay?"

"Straight to the point, aren't ya? Well, if I were you, I'd be a little more concerned about me. After all, maybe I want to kill you. Most people do."

"If you weren't a friend, you would have let us die in the desert."

"Maybe I wanted to do the job myself. Maybe I wanted the credit."

"You would have at least captured us in some way. We could just get up and leave," said Twilight, becoming less confident in her initial assertion that this person was a friend.

"You don't think you're trapped? Yeah you go ahead and leave, and go back into that desert. Let me know how that goes. I am the only person living in this desert, and I have the only teleporter out, which only responds to my finger print," said the man.

"Well, why wouldn't you have killed us already?" said Twilight becoming decreasingly comfortable with where this conversation was going. Twilight tried out her horn but not even a single spark would come out of it and, in her weakened state, Twilight was suddenly aware she couldn't take him. She could barely move.

"You think some ponies suddenly show up in our world, and I don't at least have some questions to ask before killing them? I'm not as curious as I used to be, but there must be a thing or two I'd still like to know before dying, or else surely I would have let the worms have their way with this wretched body," said the man.

Twilight realized for the first time that the only exit to the cave was on the other side of the man. Twilight wasn't sure why she even bothered spotting the exit, as they would surely die if they went back out there, but the escalation of the conversation made it difficult to not at least wonder. "Well, you wouldn't have put a wet rag on Rainbow Dash's head if that were the case," blurted out Twilight, desperate for anything that suggested this person wasn't their enemy.

"Blast! Betrayed again by my own kindness," said the man, with a smile overtaking his face. With how deformed it was, it looked more like someone had carved another scar into his face, but it promptly returned to its normal expressionless look. It wasn't a vacant look, but rather one that suggested that nothing he cared much about was happening.

"My name is Walter. As for your friend, I ain't no doctor or vet, and I certainly don't know anything about pony diseases, but she seems to just be suffering from heat exhaustion. She should be fine after drinking and eating. However, don't get the wrong idea; I can't say for sure I won't attack you until I know some things," said Walter.

"Are you always this 'friendly'?" mumbled Dash who just opened her eyes. Twilight didn't even realize how aggressive his voice sounded in saying this, until Dash replied, without even knowing what he had said. Twilight then reiterated what Dash said.

"I wouldn't know, as I haven't interacted very much with anyone for years. Ever since my family died, I only leave this desert when I need something," replied Walter in his usual unwavering gruff voice, as Twilight gave Dash a glass of water, which she began sipping from. As she drank, Twilight told her what Walter said, but she then proceeded to ask what she was dying to know.

"Are you okay?" asked Twilight.

"Yeah, I've been through worse," lied Dash, with a faint smile. Dash then turned back to Walter and asked, "How did they die?" Twilight proceeded to translate for her.

"Same way everyone dies. I don't remember their scientific name, but it's those stupid black spiked monsters. For the sixty years of silence, people died of old age and disease; but after that time passed, I ain't heard of anyone dying to much else, save the occasional stray razor wind," spat Walter.

Twilight was about to tell Dash what he had said, when she noticed Dash had fallen back asleep. "Black spiked monsters?" said Twilight.

"Well, that answers my first question. So there is such a thing as a world without those dreaded things. Then again, maybe a world without them isn't possible for us. The Veranians thought such a world was possible during the sixty silent years. The sixty year silence was broken with every single one of them dead."

"So, you wanted to know something about us?" inquired Twilight, who needed to do something to shift the conversation from its increasingly morbid tone.

"Of course I do. Some crazy cult, which had maybe a hundred people, turned out to be right. Naturally, that cult grew into the predominant way of thought once they actually managed to prove that another world with ponies in it actually existed. But even then, can you blame me for remaining skeptical? Yet here you are, with a whole world full of people who want you dead. The first thing I must know is why are you here?" said Walter.

"To make a long story short, our presence here is a complete accident."

"How 'bout you make a long story long."

"Well, there was a robot that used its scanning methods to discover I was some human..."

"Tripe!"

"Excuse me, but did you have something to say."

"That's a load of tripe! I may not know much about science or robotics, but one thing I do know is that any robots you would have encountered, would be battle drones of some variety, and battle drones, do not have scanners."

"But he said..."

"Either it was lying or you are. I don't care which. Just move on to the next part."

Twilight was glad to see the robot's claims shut down so easily, yet she could not help being disappointed in herself for not seeing that rather obvious flaw herself. She sighed and continued, "It gave me a hard drive, which contained a program that I accidentally ran, that took us here."

"Come again?"

"A program that, when executed, brought us here."

"I know what you said! I meant, how did it bring you here? Was this program one that ran some sort of vehicle or teleporter that brought you here?"

"No, it just brought us here, when I activated it with my magic."

"Magic?" 

"You don't have magic? But then, how do you run your programs?"

"They run on a computer, and they can only do tasks on a computer."

"Then why would it have had a program on it, it couldn't use?"

"Exactly! Your whole story sounds like crap to me, but whatever. I believe you are here by accident, as there are only two of you and you would have died without me… Heck, you well still may. Next question, did your kind really steal your planet from us?"

Twilight didn't want to make herself look guilty, but she couldn't manage to stop herself from pointing out the obvious flaw with his question in saying, "You do realize that no one would ever say yes to that question right?"

"Just answer the question!"

"It is our belief that your ancestors wanted to kill us, so the only way we could live in safety without killing them was to send them here."

"It would have been kinder to just kill them."

"How can you say that?"

"Look around you! This place is just conducive enough to life to keep torturing the creatures who have the misfortune of being born! We come up with better technology to protect ourselves, and the creatures just get stronger to counteract it. Even the wealthy have little advantage over the poor, except for the extremely poor, as we are nearly powerless against them. It is only because we reproduce more frequently than they attack that our numbers have increased."

"I'm sorry. Maybe we can kill a couple before we go," said Twilight trying not to think of what Fluttershy would say. By Walter's, description she would have feared them. But she likely still would have been disappointed in Twilight's suggestion. She had a hard time herself believing she had suggested it, but she felt responsible. Ponies had gotten them into this mess, so maybe she could do at least a little to help out.

"As if they can be killed. It must have happened at some point before, but never is there a documented case of even seeing one dead. Sure, you have a person here or there bragging to their friends when they've had a pint too many, but nothing verifiable."

"What did he say?" asked Dash, whose eyes were barely open. Twilight told her.

"It wouldn't be the first thing I've done that has only happened in legends," said Rainbow Dash, whom slipped back into unconsciousness. Twilight again translated for her.

"I like your spunk, but don't waste your stupid lives on that. Say you get one or two? So what? There are plenty more."

"So how did you find us anyway?" asked Twilight trying to think of any possible way to change the subject because, even though it didn't sound like Walter was blaming them, Twilight couldn't shake the feeling that maybe he should be.

"Your appearance is all over the internet, so knowing something was up was easy enough. Projections of the window you left out of had you burning to death in lava, but heading in the general direction of the desert, so I figured there was a chance I'd have guests. I went outside, not expecting to find anything, but it's not like I had much else to do while waiting for death, squeezing out an answer or two to life's questions where I can. Then I saw something, and I chased it for a couple of miles. When I caught up to it, it disappeared, but where it stopped, there you two were."

"What did you see?"

"I saw my son. His body was never found, so that happens sometimes. Post traumatic stress disorder and all. He seemed more real this time, but I guess that's just a sign that I really am getting closer to him with every passing year," said Walter without his facial expression changing once. Twilight had begun to wonder if he was capable of facial expression, and if maybe that one smile was a fluke, but his voice never changed either.

Twilight didn't know what to say. She had only in history books heard of someone's child dying before, and that nagging sense of being responsible, since ponies sent them to this world, wouldn't leave her alone. The thought occurred to her that, since she was a human, it wasn't really her kind, but she didn't find this thought comforting. It was time for yet another subject change.

"That cultic group you mentioned earlier wouldn't happened to have been named Logos, would it?" asked Twilight

"So those stupid rocks got through, eh? Who knows why they used rocks, but they were a pretty fanatic group, so even I, who studied people for a living, can't hazard a guess as to their motives on that one. That stupid group probably would have never become so well known, if they hadn't conned a select few rich members into joining. From there it was pretty easy for them to hire people who didn't even believe what they were saying, such as myself, and then eventually prove the existence of a world of ponies."

"You've mentioned this proof a couple of times now, and I cannot help but be curious, how did they do that?" said Twilight.

"Well, if you want to get technical, it isn't a proof so much as it is various conclusions that a world of magical ponies leads to, which otherwise would be unexpected, were verified experimentally. It is said that out of the millions of people in our world, only five actually understand what most have come to call a proof, but they were such big names in the world of science, and science has come to be so highly regarded, that now most people believe. Of course, there are still several people such as myself who did not believe, but that is always the case. All five had such big egos that they changed their names to Greek letters, with the single most prominent, who is now head of what used to be a cult, calling himself by two Greek letters. He is called Dr. AlphaOmega, but that is neither here nor there," said Walter.

It seemed to Twilight that there was little else to be said about the proof, as it seemed Walter did not know much about it; so she thought to revert to their previous conversation before they got on this tangent. However, she then remembered she hadn't liked where that topic had been going either, so she instead asked, "You studied people for a living?"

"I read many papers on behavioral patterns of humans, and used them to attempt to come up with as logical an explanation as possible as to why those cultic beliefs survived for as long as they did. Many similar, and likewise stupid, cults often took less than a hundred years to die out, and they hired me to find out why they were different. Basically, the living conditions made it hard not to blame something, and the living conditions made the thought of a planet waiting to be reclaimed very appealing. Even still I couldn't help but wonder why, of all things, to blame ponies, but now I know the reason. It is true. No doubt our ancestors passed down stories to us."

The nagging thoughts that she had been repressing broke free, as she could not contain them anymore. Twilight couldn't believe the living conditions of this planet had allowed people, through many generations, to still remember how the ponies had wronged them. Twilight hated to admit it, but in a perverse way, it sounded like justice. How had a conversation about his work likewise taken a detour into the uncomfortable? Was it that the ponies had really wronged them so much that Twilight's mind couldn't help going back to it, or that this guy couldn't carry on a non-awkward conversation to save his life? Twilight couldn't decide which it was, but it didn't matter. One thing Twilight could no longer deny was that the ponies had wronged them. Was there really no better place to have sent them than this? Surely they must have made the decision in haste, not even stopping to think that thousands of years from now, people would still be living here. Twilight was furious. She wanted to confide in a friend the unbelievable news she had just heard and, fortunately, Rainbow Dash seemed to be awake again.

After Twilight blurted out the news, Rainbow Dash took off into the air and said through clenched teeth, "Celestia and I are going to have some words when I get back!" She couldn't support herself for long, however, so she fell back down immediately following the last syllable.

Twilight instantly regretted telling her friend, who hadn't yet recovered, such stirring news. "Take it easy, Rainbow Dash. You still haven't recovered. I am as angry as you, but we don't really have anypony to blame, since even Celestia hadn't been born yet," said Twilight.

"I'm not surprised to learn that you're not as heartless as the tales claim. I'm curious as to what the truth actually is, but I've already outlived the live expectancy of the most fortified nations by five years by making it to fifty five, so I know I won't be around long enough to find that out. At least I'll contribute to the research as to whether or not those creatures are less likely to attack individuals than they are groups. One thing I can do before I die, is help you ponies get back to the research facility," said Walter.

"Why would we want to go back there?" asked Twilight.

"If anywhere has a portal to your home world, that would be it. I haven't been there in years, so I don't know what they have, but it's the only place that might. Though, if your world hasn't been taken over yet, it probably means you have a low chance of getting there without dying, otherwise they would have used it by now. You seem like the sort of people willing to take that kind of chance, though."

Twilight couldn't believe that amidst trying to stay alive, and figuring out why a guy like Walter would have rescued them, she had completely forgotten about trying to get home. They had almost died coming out here, could they really survive going back? Yet, Walter seemed sure it was their only hope.

"How can you help us with that?" asked Twilight.

They encourage former employees to come back and expand their research, should they get bored. Naturally, we don't get paid for this, but it is encouraged; so we have access to the building. I could set my teleporter to take you there.

"I thought the facility had better security than that," said Twilight.

"From the outside, their security is what most would call good, in order to keep those black demons at bay, but in terms of people getting in and out, the security isn't great. It's only been around for thirty years, but already some of them will brag that they have the first impenetrable fortress to keep those creatures at bay. No matter how much I insisted that those monsters had once left us completely alone for sixty years, or that an effective means of keeping them at bay has never been invented despite thousands of years of effort, they still insist that their security is good. I guess there really are no bounds to human hubris."

"Darn it, what is this air made out of? Acid?" coughed Dash, prompting Twilight to repeat the question to Walter.

"I'd forgotten all about that. I don't remember, but I think it is a bit acidic, actually. We have since adapted to it, but our ancestors used to only live to about twenty because of it. Once we began adapting to that, razor winds become more prevalent. After developing walls effective at shielding us from that, the black demon attacks increased. If I were a superstitious man I would say the Old Earth is trying to kill us," said Walter.

"Old Earth?" inquired Twilight.

"Our planet was renamed that fairly recently, when the former cult proved that human ponies of another dimension exist, and the belief in pony lore became predominant. The idea being that we will take back our home, the New Earth, soon enough, and then this will become the Old Earth. I can't remember what it was called before the Old Earth, though," said Walter.

Walter then got up, and said, "I just have one more question, before I let you ponies rest some more. What is it like?"

"What?" said Twilight.

"To live in a world that doesn't hate you."

Twilight mumbled his question under her breath, searching for words to convey a world she took for granted to someone who had never known such luxury, but Rainbow cut her off by saying, "Come see for yourself." Twilight repeated this for Walter.

Walter again took on that crack in his face that seemingly was meant to be a smile. "If only this were ten years ago, I would have taken you up on that, but I am too old, and my inevitable dying along the way would only slow you down. Your chances are bad enough without my help. Just tell me this, can you actually relax? Does your family actually stay alive?"

It was the question with the most obvious answer, yet it was the most awkward, as the instinctive answer of "duh" was insensitive. After a few awkward seconds, Twilight muttered a yes, and Walter left the room with that same smile. The ponies drank, ate, and then rested. The following morning, after eating and taking the nearest thing to a shower Walter's cave had to offer, the ponies saw Walter fiddling with his teleporter. Twilight was delighted to see that Dash seemed to be completely better.

"What do those numbers mean?" asked Twilight, pointing to two big numbers on the screen of the teleporter terminal.

"They indicate the coordinates that the teleporter is currently set to warp things to. Currently, they are set to the position of this teleporter, as one should always calibrate their teleporter before using it."

"Calibrate?" asked Twilight.

"I don't really understand the science behind it, but basically, you fiddle with this knob until the teleporter functions properly. The easy way to do this involves teleporting trash from the teleporter to itself to see if it arrives unharmed. If the object arrives in pieces you turn the knob up. If it instead has burn marks on it, you turn the knob down," said Walter.

Twilight wasn't sure why, as she never intended on coming back here, but she committed the coordinates of this teleporter to memory. It was probably because she was curious what a good example of numbers that qualify as coordinates might look like, though admittedly nothing looked particularly special about these numbers. She had read about the concept of coordinates before, but Equestria didn't use them, so she had never seen any before.

"Are you and your friend ready?" asked Walter.

Twilight wished she had some sort of plan, but given how little they knew about where they were going, it was impossible to form one. Twilight had tried several times during the night to remember something, anything, about this world she had lived in, but to no avail. Some parts of her old memories and knowledge were readily accessible, while others came back only when she saw something that triggered them, but most of them were just gone.

"What do you know about this fortress?" asked Twilight.

"Sorry, but this building is massive, and I don't know anything about the parts of it you'd be interested in. All I can tell you is that what you are looking for is not in the basement floors, which is what I am used to," said Walter.

Twilight was afraid he'd say something like that. Twilight's instincts told her to wait around and study, but the knowledge she was looking for probably wasn't anywhere she could find, and she desperately wanted to see her friends. She really had no idea how Dash and her could succeed; then again, she didn't know how they'd survive either, but somehow they had managed that. If she ever wanted to see her friends again, she had to somehow do this. At least she wasn't alone.

Twilight proceeded to translate for the following conversation. "Wait, before anypony does anything, there's something I must know. Why are you helping us?" said Dash.

"I don't know. I had thought I just wanted answers, but maybe I just needed something to care about. People are strange like that, and for me it has been a long time. I care about this," said Walter.

"This? You mean us?" said Dash.

Walter looked at the ground and replied "Yeah."

Twilight started to open her mouth, no doubt to say something emotional or inspiring, but Walter cut her off, "Don't look into it too much. I have always thought people who blamed all their problems on some ponies are stupid, and now that I've met you I still think that. If the people that hate you are stupid, well then, naturally, I wouldn't want to be one of them."

Twilight decided not to say anything after all, but instead just marveled at Walter. Never had she seen anyone so inept at emotion, but maybe that is what the Old Earth did to people. Regardless, Walter was admitting he cared for them the only way he knew how and, silly though it was, Twilight didn't want to ruin that, so she simply added, "Yeah, you're not so bad yourself."

Then Walter hit the button, and the ponies were whisked away.

As everything came back into focus, a tall broad white man in a lab coat and the tiled floor on which he stood were all they could see, for everything else was shrouded in darkness, but he had a spotlight on him.

Rainbow Dash immediately darted toward him, but quickly slammed into something that seemed to be glass. It did not seem to be even remotely disturbed by the impact of Rainbow Dash. It did not appear to refract any light, so it could not be seen. Rainbow Dash then ran back to the teleporter as Twilight tried pressing buttons near it, but she couldn't even get the little monitor to turn on.

"That teleporter is currently only set to receive, and cannot be altered from that setting by anything other than the main computer that is responsible for running this building," said the man in the lab coat in a deep voice.

Rainbow Dash whispered to Twilight, "This would be a good time for magic."

"Good point," replied Twilight, who proceeded to try to teleport to the other side, but not even a single spark came out of her horn.

"Nice try, but the computer has already disabled your magic," said the man in the lab coat.

"Computer, take these two somewhere more suitable for study," said the man.

"I cannot do that," came a gentle female voice that seemed to _emanate_ from all around them.

"Why not?" asked the man.

"I am afraid our knowledge of the capabilities of ponies' magic is highly limited. As such, I cannot ignore the unlikely event that she had cast a spell upon arrival, before my magical negation went into effect. Said spell could be making her appear as you and vice-versa. Thankfully we do have sufficient data on their magical abilities to know that they are not capable of making one more logical. A test must be administered," said the female voice.

"Fine. Whatever," said the man.

"The test that has been selected is Aura Field."

"What? Just give her a test, not a game."

"A game is, in fact, a competitive form of test."

"Why should I be forced to participate?"

"The exact logical capability of a pony is unknown. It is only known that humans are more logical, thus your participation is required. Whoever wins must be the human. I would have hoped one as logical as yourself would be able to understand these proceedings."

Two floating images, not unlike the ones Twilight had used to program, appeared. One was in front of Twilight, and the other was in front of the man. The image was of a seven by seven arrangement of equally spaced black dots.

"The rules are simple. First player is represented by red and squares. Second player is represented by blue and circles. Circles emit a blue aura to other shapes in a cardinal direction of them. Likewise squares emit a red aura. A shape's color is determined by the auras being emitted to it, but a shape itself does nothing to help determine its own color. If it has an equal amount of red and blue being emitted to it, it will be white, and thus neutral. Red shapes are owned by player one and Blue shapes are owned by player two. Whenever two shapes that are not owned by opposing players, unless they are both neutral, are immediately in a cardinal direction of one another, a line of the color of the shape that isn't white, will form between the two. The first player to connect the left to the right, or the bottom to the top, with a line of their color, wins. In order to achieve this, each player takes turns placing their shape onto one of the black dots. In the interest of brevity, you have one hour. Entity who appears as Dr. Gamma, you are first player," said the female voice.

Twilight thought she caught all that, but she admitted she wasn't quite sure. Maybe things would become more clear after the guy in the lab coat (what had she called him again?) took his turn.

He touched the screen and a single white square appeared where one of the black dots had been. Hadn't she said that first player was represented by squares and red? Why wasn't the square red? Twilight sighed. She would just have to overcome her momentary failure to understand the rules, by doing really well after she caught on. She liked logical puzzles, so this shouldn't be too hard, but not knowing what was going on still frustrated her.

She touched a random dot on the screen, and a white circle appeared. Maybe the computer had somehow been mistaken when she said there were colors in this game, however she was immediately proven to be wrong, as her opponent's move was right next to hers; his shape turned blue and hers turned red. Isn't that the opposite of what the computer had said? Was it intentionally trying to mislead her? But then, it would only do that if it was sure she was a pony and if that were true, what was the point of this little game?

Twilight stared at the board for a second. It was almost as though the color of the shapes were determined by the pieces around them. Yes of course! Hadn't it said something about emitting auras, and cardinal directions? Naturally, the white shapes were white because there was no aura being admitted to them. Twilight understood now, and she hadn't even wasted many turns in her attempt to understand.

However, her opponent was not to be underestimated. Turn after turn, he had more colored shapes and more lines than her, but even with only two available dots left on the board, neither of them had connected one side to another. Twilight was just a couple of lines away, but no matter where she placed her shape it wouldn't form the needed lines to give her victory. She was quite sure this was going to be a draw.

"It is worth noting that in the event of a tie, the player with the most shapes of their color wins," interjected the voice.

Suddenly the one minute left on the clock seemed quite menacing. Further the lab coat guy had at least six more shapes of his color than Twilight did. Her one move could do nothing to change that. Her only hope of getting Dash and her home shattered, by a lack of knowledge of the rules. Who was she kidding? What would she really have done differently if she had known about this rule? The truth was she just wasn't smart enough.

Twilight put her hooves on her head to keep it from exploding. Her head hadn't been throbbing like this in over a day, and it was making up for lost time. She knew that it was inevitable, but she just couldn't make the move that would doom them all. It was so much better when she wasn't responsible for their demise. If only... if only... but sentences began to evade her pounding head.

But at the sound of the voice she had unknowingly longed to hear spoke in its usual energetic tone, her headache dissipated. Rainbow Dash said while pointing to one of the black dots, "Pick that one."

Twilight was fairly sure, based on the confused look that had long been present on her face, that Rainbow Dash didn't understand the rules of the game. So why was she telling Twilight where to go? Then Rainbow Dash began glowing again and her harmony necklace formed around her neck. The man in the lab coat stood there stunned, but Twilight realized exactly what this meant. Clearly Twilight's desperation was obvious and Rainbow Dash knew they were doomed. She wouldn't let Twilight be responsible for picking the losing move. Twilight wanted to say so much more, but there was nothing more that could be said, than simply the "thank you" that she said. Rainbow Dash didn't ask what for. This verified what Twilight suspected. Rainbow Dash knew exactly what was going on.

Twilight picked the black dot Rainbow Dash had suggested, and indeed there were still more red squares than blue, and no miracle lines jumped out of nowhere to make Twilight victorious. However when her opponent took the final move of the game, his piece was surrounded by circles and so turned red and it was in just the right place for the needed two lines to form. Twilight had never even considered the possibility of winning on his turn.

"Winner of the game, and thus the real Dr. Gamma, what would you have me do?" asked the voice. At hearing his name again a surge of memory unclogged in Twilight's brain. She remembered Dr. Gamma and all his risky, defiant, schemes.

"Is the teleportation to Equestria capability complete?" asked Twilight.

"It has just undergone its final testing stages. However, results are still being analyzed. Everything looks good so far, but it is not advisable to use," said the computer.

"Send my assistant and I to Equestria, and destroy the technology to do so, once you have sent us. I have a plan," muttered Twilight, ironically not having a plan at all.

"You are reckless as usual, I see. The others will not like it, but I have noticed a slightly higher success rate for your schemes than their plans. I will do as you say," were the last words Twilight heard, before her library began to come back into focus. As they returned to Twilight's library, the thought occurred to Rainbow Dash that, since they had seemed to be doomed anyway, what she had done didn't require much loyalty, so why had she been glowing?

"Why did you let her leave?" asked a large tan man sitting on an ornate golden chair that had red precious stones of many varieties engraved into it in numerous places.

"Fear not" came the voice of a shiny robot that had the same form as the one Twilight saw, and sounded almost as if it were gasping for breath. "We can teleport her back, at any time. She must believe the illusion is real. She must believe her fate rests on logic, so we can properly demonstrate to her how illogical she has become."

"If we can teleport people to and fro, why toy with this pony? Let us send in an army."

"Patience, my lord. We can only warp so many beings at a time, and we can only do it a few times a day. Sending in an army would take far too long. They would be aware of what we were doing long before a sizable force could be gotten through. No, Celestia did not realize it, but by making one of our men a pony, she has actually created the ultimate weapon."

"That is exactly what I am afraid of. While she could be of great use to us if we could turn her against her own kind, is such a thing possible?"

"I have studied her for many years, and I can say conclusively that it is more than possible. If, with one conversation, I was able to get her to question everything, think how much more can be done once we show her how far from her logical nature she has fallen. The rest will take time, but will be easy."

"Are you sure you can do such thing? After all, today was a failure."

"A failure? No, today was to test to what extent becoming a pony damaged her reasoning. This, sadly, was unable to be well tested in the pony world, as there are few, if any, opportunities that require such a thing. Now that that is known, we have but to force her to use logic, despite her optimism about her friends clouding her judgment, and she will come to see herself as a failure, for dooming her friends by her ineptitude at logic. It will be a long process, but she is the only one who can wield both logic and illogic, and combine them into programming that affects reality itself. She has no idea of what she is truly capable of, or that only she is capable of it."

"Speaking of which, how did you know she would run that program?"

"I didn't even know for sure she had the capacity to run reality altering programs, but it was the only way I could think of, by which we might stand a chance. Little does she know that we would never have been able to make a connection between her world and ours without her help. It is just unfortunate that I did not have the foresight to program in a stronger connection to the teleportation program before giving it to her to be run."

"At least you did think to give us some small portion of her reality altering power, instead of merely bringing her here with it."

"Indeed. Also, I had the foresight to have it start a process which automatically shuts down any reality programs she tries to run here, so she can't use that great power against us. As for our power, I'm just glad we never had to use it to stop her from dying. For a moment there, I thought for sure that we would have to intervene directly, thus possibly blowing our cover. Thankfully, between her and that other pony, they managed to survive the lava pit. They never would have survived that desert but, thankfully, I thought to send that old coot after them with a vision of his son."

"I have to admit, using a crazy person's delusions for our benefit was rather brilliant of you. Of all the AI's I have come across, yours seems to have had just the right random configuration of starting variables to be one of the most brilliant I have ever seen. Even still, I cannot help but wonder how you managed to study Twilight undetected for so long?"

"Once I had discovered that Dr. Beta was still alive in pony form, how could I not? When walking through Everfree forest, I placed a microscopic microphone onto her."

"How did you find that out, anyway?"

"From a similar chip on Celestia, I overheard a rather interesting conversation she had with her sister."

"Where did you get these microphones?"

"Apparently, what few things _were_ transferred successfully were transferred too close to the same spot. Apparently, about a hundred years ago, we thought maybe radio waves would somehow get back to our world."

"Interesting. How did you get them on the ponies?"

"That was difficult and risky, hence why I only ever did it twice. I was never designed for stealth. I got lucky with Celestia. She didn't want any of her guards getting hurt fighting Nightmare Moon so, for once, she was unguarded. She then did something most surprising. She closed her eyes and awaited her sister to capture her. She didn't have the heart to fight her sister again herself. Naturally, this made the perfect opportunity for me to put the mic on her. For Twilight, I just waited until night fall and planted it on her."

"All very intriguing. However, I cannot help but wonder what if your little plan fails?"

"We kill Twilight and send over the armed forces slowly. As I said, it's inefficient and non-ideal, but it would work."

"Very well, and how long before we bring Twilight back?"

"Honestly, I suspect we won't need too. We should have patience because, if I am right, it will not make her suspicious if she comes back of her own will."

"Why do you suspect she will come back?"

"Because it will eventually occur to her that technology doesn't stay broken for long. She will realize that she hasn't done enough to stop us from getting to Ponyville, and that her desire to return home clouded her judgment."

"Your brilliance has merited my trust for now. Don't disappoint me."


End file.
